Career Guidance and Counseling in Pakistan

When you google Career “Guidance and Counseling in Pakistan”, the first link you’ll see is an article written by Farah A. Ibrahim and Iffat Almas some 27 year ago. Since then I suppose we haven’t done any, substantial enough, research that could be published in any international journal. (I would be more then happy to see if there are any)

Following is the summary of that article and a question.

Farah A. Ibrahim (University of Connecticut, USA) and Iffat Almas (Institute of Educational Vocational Guidance and Counseling, USA) 1983

Summary This article traces the development of the guidance and counseling movement in Pakistan. Guidance and counseling services in the educational and vocational domains emerged as a result of the efforts of the Pakistan Federation of University Women and other organizations (both national and international). The article presents the development of a philosophical base and how this movement is changing the perception of what education should entail in the schools, the college, and university. The educational and vocational guidance and counseling movement is on the brink of becoming a national reality at all educational levels.

I am wondering are we any near to “The educational and vocational guidance and counseling movement” or it “on the brink of becoming a national reality at all educational levels.” in Pakistan?

Career Guidance on PTV by A.R. Memon

In 2008 A.R. Memon produced a wonderful series of interviews with professionals from different areas of work. It was an excellent effort to educate students on various career options available to them in Pakistan. Since then we have not seen any program on TV regarding career guidance and counseling. I am curious if there is any program currently available on TV or Radio on career guidance?

Some career guidance programs produced my A.R. Memon on PTV are available on Youtube. Below are the comments made by A R Memon on an exclusive interview with Kalpoint.com panel.

KPDC: How important do you think Career Counseling is for nurturing the youth of our country?

AKM: I don’t think we have any career counseling programs in our country. There is no such trend in Pakistan. Career counseling is very essential. In universities abroad, especially in the developed countries, there is proper career counseling available for the students. This helps the students in selecting the career that suits them best. Career counseling provides guidance to the youngsters which helps them a long way. Actually, without career counseling we can never know about our skills. Career counseling tells us about our own skills and capabilities.

Unfortunately, in our society, there is lack of awareness about the career counseling or career guidance. What happens is that parents tell their children that they have to become a doctor or an engineer etc. We don’t bother about what our children want to become or what are their aptitude. Another thing is that we think that career counseling is useless. Parents say that we did not receive any counseling, yet we have been successful in our careers. But I would say that not every one can enjoy luck. We should give proper guidance to our children and let them decide what they want to become, instead of thrusting our own desires on them.

So, I would like to request all the universities to start career counseling programs. I would also request the parents in our country that they should not force their children to choose a field. Let them decide themselves about their careers and do provide them proper guidance. I hope, in the near future there will be more awareness about it and proper career counseling will be made available to our youth. Furthermore I feel the role of Media in guiding the students about their future very important. Currently there are some programs on channels regarding this topic, but I think, the scale of such program should be maximized. In this regard I am also hosting a program on PTV News on the topic of Career Guidance & Career Counseling, which comes on air every Sunday at 7:05 pm, so far many program have been done on various topics with experts of that relevant fields, such as:

Pakistan Army (General S.P. Shahid)
Pakistan Air Force (Air Vice Marshal Abid Raza)
Pakistan Navy (Admiral M.I. Arshad)
Information Technology (Khurram H. Kalia)
Insurance (Saifuddin Zoomkawala)
Education (Professor Mazhar-ul-haq Siddiqui)
Journalism (Qazi Asad Abid)
Advocate (Justice Saeed-uz-Zaman Siddiqui)
Advertisement (Noman Nabi)
Nursing (Dr. Fouzia)
Air Hosting (Ms. Liby)
Police (Mr. Niaz Ahmed Siddiqui)
Flying (Captain Filex)
Pharmaceutical (Mr. Qaiser Waheed)
Charted Accounting (Mr. Shabbar Zaidi)

For the full interview see the following link

http://education.kalpoint.com/pow/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=332