KARACHI: The Professionals Academy of Commerce (PAC) has partnered with The Citizens Foundation (TCF) to assist deserving TCF Alumni pursue a career in accountancy. PAC will help TCF Alumni undertake studies in the field of accountancy by providing financial aid up to Rs 5 million, the scholarship will cover the tuition fee as well as cost of the books. Under the partnership, PAC will provide admission to five TCF alumni every year for a complete course of Chartered Accountancy, says a Press release.
In 2018-19, TCF revealed its latest fact sheet where the number of students that have successfully completed their matric stands at 28,876. Eighty-eight percent of TCF alumni have gone to college and 71% are gainfully employed. “TCF wants to help more alumni to have an opportunity of gaining tertiary education in their field of choice. Our partnership with The Professionals Academy of Commerce will help aspiring accountants from TCF get a step closer to their dreams. We are humbled by PAC’s readiness in supporting TCF alumni. And I am certain that this initiative will bring a truly meaningful positive difference on the community level. In many ways, it will create a level playing field and lead to a more balanced society,” said Riaz Kamlani, EVP, TCF.
Pakistan is the world’s sixth largest populous country and has the second-highest number of out-of-school children in the world. Out-of-school-children in Pakistan often face deep-rooted structural inequalities that are most often linked to gender biases, poverty and lack of access to quality schools. It is in response to this crisis that six Pakistani citizens put their own money into a pilot to build 5 schools in Karachi’s worst slums.
Today TCF is operating 1,567 school units in700 sites across Pakistan where children were previously out-of-school. The Economist has called TCF “perhaps the largest network of independently run schools in the world.” The Foundation is the largest private employer of women in Pakistan with more than 12,000 teachers, principals and support staff. As of April 2019, TCF has an enrolment of 252,000 deserving students, nearly half (48%) of whom are girls.
Sharing his thoughts at the signing ceremony, Director of PAC, Talha Ahmed, said, “Education remains a social and economic issue that needs our immediate attention. PAC has a proven track record of teaching accounting qualification (CA, ACCA and CFA) in Pakistan with over 0.1 million alumni working in renowned organizations. PAC has over 113 certificate of merits and 26 gold medals. We are certain that having TCF students enrolled in our program will be a big win and help bridge the class divide on my levels.”
TCF has managed successful partnerships with the leading universities of Pakistan such as IBA, LUMS, IoBM, NUST and the goal is to offer a more diverse set of tertiary program options to TCF alumni. Partnership with PAC to facilitate less privilege students become accountants will be a new chapter and hopefully will create opportunities for future alliances. Children should have equal options for career training on tertiary level as well.