Risking and Securing Out of School Children: Parents’ Perspective in a Semi-Urban Community

The present research article deals with the perspective of parents regarding the future of their out of school children and their concept of educational development. Qualitative research techniques which includes in-depth interviews, participant observation and FGDs were used for data collection. Bari Imam, near Quaid i Azam University Islamabad was the research site. Purposive sampling technique was used and only those parents were chosen who had out of school children. To understand the parents’ perspective about out of school children, the concepts have been borrowed from Social Learning Theory, which has three major components e.g. observation, imitating and then modeling. Results of the study indicated that parents had serious reservations about the educational system of Pakistan and the future outcome of education. They preferred short-term to boost their household economy rather than a long term investment on their children’s education which is necessary for the social as well as the personal development. Under the influence of social learning, parents imitating others started sending their children to acquire technical skills, which brought early monetary rewards. Study concluded that, parents were forced to send their children for earning rather than to the schools. Mainstream culture prevailing in the area was to send the children for vocational and technical trainings for rapid monetary benefits. In the current scenario the natives influenced each other which was positive in the context of money and rewards, but negative for the child’s educational development.