Zahid Karim
UNDENIABLY, in Pakistan, a degree has become a piece of paper rather than a passport to a promising future. Thousands of youth graduate every year holding university degrees, yet they remain structurally unemployable. In fact, the market demands practical, technical, and digital competencies that traditional institutions failed to provide. The roots of this paradox lie in a colonial inheritance. The British built an educational system in the subcontinent that is unable to produce thinkers, intellectuals, scholars and scientists but to staff a clerical bureaucracy. Indeed, independence changed the flag only but not a colonial mindset and logic. Seven decades on, the Pakistan has only witnessed a degree inflation rather than competence, proficiency or expertise. The country, therefore, needs to rethink what it means to be an educated nation. The real measure of educational success should not be the number of universities, graduates or degrees awarded, but the number of people who can solve problems, create value, spur innovation and to compete internationally.
Every year, thousands of young men and women enter colleges and universities with dreams of becoming doctors, engineers, lawyers, bankers, teachers, civil servants and entrepreneurs. Families make enormous financial sacrifices to educate their children. They believe that a degree will open the doors to employment, dignity and economic security. Yet, after graduation, many discover an uncomfortable reality that a degree is no longer a guarantee of employability. We are producing graduates, but not necessarily producing employable graduates. We have expanded higher education, but failed to cultivate skills, innovation, critical thinking and practical training. The question Pakistan must therefore confront is not simply, how many graduates are we producing? It is: What can our graduates actually do?
For decades, academic qualifications have been treated as the principal passport to professional success. A bachelor or master degree was traditionally viewed as evidence of knowledge, competence and readiness for the workplace. However, the labour market has changed dramatically. It increasingly requires communication skills, digital literacy, problem-solving, data analysis, teamwork, adaptability, professional writing, technological competence and practical experience. Ironically, a university graduate who possesses theoretical knowledge but cannot communicate effectively, analyze a problem, prepare a professional report, use modern digital tools or perform workplace tasks. This creates a troubling gap between qualification and capability. The problem is not that degrees are useless. The problem is that a degree without relevant skills may have limited economic value.
Moreover, Pakistan has witnessed considerable expansion in higher education. Contrarily, expansion in the number of institutions does not mean an improvement in the quality or relevance of education. In some cases, students spend years memorizing textbooks, preparing for examinations and completing assignments that have little connection with professional realities. They may graduate with impressive transcripts but limited exposure to workplaces, laboratories, research, entrepreneurship or practical problem-solving. This is where the education system requires a fundamental change in philosophy. Education should not be reduced to examination success. A graduate should leave university with at least three forms of capital: knowledge, skills and character. Knowledge provides understanding; skills provide economic usefulness; and character provides professional responsibility. If one of these dimensions is missing, education remains incomplete.
Additionally, Pakistan is blessed with a youth bulge that places over 60% of its population under the age of thirty. A youthful population can become an extraordinary economic asset if young people are educated, trained and employed productively. The opposite, however, is equally possible. This phenomenon may turn asset into liability. If young people spend years obtaining qualifications without acquiring marketable skills, frustration can replace opportunity. The economy may simultaneously have too many people with the wrong skills and too few people with the right ones. The distinction between education and employability therefore matters enormously.
Furthermore, unemployment and underemployment rates among university graduates have climbed significantly. The latest LFS reports that over 14.9% struggle to find meaningful, formal employment. Thousands emerge each year from business schools, engineering faculties, and law colleges only to soar the rate of unemployment. The deeper concern, however, is not unemployment alone but underemployment. A graduate may technically have a job but still be unable to utilize his or her education, skills and professional potential. There is the wider problem of educational mismatch with the labor market. Pakistan is therefore facing a paradox in which educational attainment is rising, yet the economy is not generating enough productive, skill-intensive employment. The challenge is no longer simply to put more young people through universities; it is to ensure that education equips them with skills that the economy can actually absorb and reward.
Pakistan must move from a degree-oriented education system to a competence-oriented education system. In this connection, universities should strengthen practical and project-based learning. Internships and apprenticeships should become meaningful components of professional education. Curricula should be regularly aligned with changing labour-market requirements. Digital literacy, communication, critical thinking and problem-solving should become cross-disciplinary skills. Technical and vocational education should receive greater investment and social recognition. Universities should measure their success not merely through enrolment and graduation figures but also through graduate employment, entrepreneurship, research and innovation. Finally, Pakistan must encourage young people to become job creators as well as job seekers.
Conclusively, Pakistan stands at a historic crossroads where its massive youth bulge can either become an unprecedented engine of national prosperity or a volatile catalyst for systemic decline. The era of treating university campuses as mere “degree factories” is over. Paper qualifications devoid of market-aligned competencies are a liability. Young people become an asset when they possess knowledge, skills, discipline, creativity and opportunities to use them. Young people need access to finance, mentorship, markets, digital infrastructure, simplified regulation and an environment in which businesses can survive and grow. Pakistan does not merely need more educated people. It needs people whose education enables them to build, innovate, produce and compete. The future of the country will ultimately depend not on how many degrees it awards, but on how effectively it converts knowledge into skills, skills into productivity, and productivity into national prosperity. It is to build a nation with knowledge, skills and the capacity to turn both into productivity. That is the transition Pakistan can no longer afford to postpone.
—The writer teaches at Iqra University,
Karachi. ([email protected])