In response to the education emergency declared by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in May, the Planning Commission released the District Education Performance Index (DEPIx), a comprehensive evaluation of Pakistan’s education system. The report provides critical insights into the challenges and disparities in education performance across 134 districts, emphasizing the need for targeted reforms to address systemic inequities. By assessing education through five key domains, the DEPIx highlights the uneven progress among provinces and districts, shedding light on areas requiring immediate attention to improve national educational outcomes.

The official report has categorized Pakistan’s education system as “low-performing” and identified several critical areas requiring urgent attention to improve outcomes. The “District Education Performance Index (DEPIx) Report 2020-23”, released by the Planning Commission, revealed that the national average score in the DEPIx stood at 53.46, placing the country in the “low” performance bracket.

Of the five measured domains, “infrastructure and access” scored the highest with 58.95, reflecting modest progress in expanding educational opportunities. “Inclusion”—encompassing equity and technology—was the second-highest scoring domain. However, “public financing” received the lowest score, underscoring the need for increased and more efficient investment in education. The “learning” domain also performed poorly, highlighting persistently low student achievement levels. Meanwhile, “governance and management” scored slightly better but remained in the “low” category, hindered by teacher shortages and frequent bureaucratic turnover.

The report noted that, despite reaching middle-income status and making progress in human capital development, Pakistan has lagged behind other developing countries and regional peers. This slow advancement poses significant challenges to leveraging the potential demographic dividend, achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, and attaining upper-middle-income status by 2047.

Improving the quality and inclusiveness of education remains a crucial factor in advancing human capital development. The report highlighted that, since the devolution of education policy in 2010 through Article 25-A of the Constitution, which enshrined the right to free education as a fundamental right, provincial governments have introduced compulsory education laws, increased budgets for schooling, and implemented governance and data reforms.

These reforms, particularly in education data management, have improved the availability of information on educational indicators. However, the complexity and fragmentation of this data continue to challenge policymakers and stakeholders in utilizing it effectively for informed decision-making.

To address the pressing issues in Pakistan’s education system and align with the education emergency declared by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in May, the Planning Commission developed composite scorecards integrating various school education indicators. The District Education Performance Index (DEPIx) assesses education performance across five domains: infrastructure and access, learning, inclusion (equity and technology), governance and management, and public financing. It evaluates 134 districts across Pakistan, including those in Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Punjab, Sindh, and the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT).

The report provides both a national and provincial overview of educational performance. Punjab emerged as the top-performing province with a composite score of 61.39, followed by KP with 54.88. Sindh and Balochistan lagged behind, scoring 51.49 and 45.70, respectively. At the district level, Islamabad is the sole district classified in the “High” performance category, standing out as the top-performing district. No district falls into the “Very High” performance category.

Alarmingly, over half of Pakistan’s districts (76) fall into the “Low” performance category, with the majority concentrated in Balochistan (33 districts) and Sindh (22 districts). Notably, all districts in Balochistan are categorized as low-performing, reflecting severe systemic challenges in the province.

Excluding Islamabad, the top 10 districts are located exclusively in Punjab and KP, with seven from Punjab and two from KP. Sindh and Balochistan have no districts in this high-performing group. Significant intra-provincial disparities are also evident in education performance. KP exhibits the greatest variation, with districts like Haripur, Chitral, and Abbottabad among the top performers, while Kolai Palas, Upper Kohistan, and Lower Kohistan rank among the lowest—a nearly 30-point gap separates the best and worst-performing districts.

Punjab and Balochistan, in contrast, show the least variation, with Punjab’s districts predominantly falling into the medium-performance category and all districts in Balochistan remaining in the low-performance bracket. Sindh exhibits moderate variation, with most districts in the “Low” category, except for the urban districts of Karachi and Hyderabad. These disparities highlight the urgent need for region-specific strategies to address the uneven education landscape across the country.

The DEPIx report underscores the urgent need to address deep-rooted challenges in Pakistan’s education system, particularly in underperforming provinces like Balochistan and Sindh. While Punjab and KP have shown relatively better performance, stark intra-provincial disparities persist, necessitating tailored strategies to bridge gaps and ensure equitable education access. The findings highlight that improving governance, increasing public financing, and addressing systemic inefficiencies are critical to achieving the nation’s educational and developmental goals. With over half of the country’s districts categorized as low-performing, a concerted effort is essential to fulfill the promise of quality education for all and leverage its transformative potential for human capital development.