Advancing Pharmacy Education in Pakistan

A country of 236 million people, Pakistan faces many challenges, including rising inequality, health disparities, and the vagaries of climate. Yet, Pakistan has a huge asset and potential in the form of burgeoning youth, who, if provided the right opportunities, can transform the country.

One institution, the School of Pharmacy (SPH) at the University of Management and Technology (UMT) in Lahore, is attempting to do this by empowering youth and placing an emphasis on social service. North Carolina-based Local 2 Global Human Development was excited to recently visit their campus. Dr. Ejaz Cheema, the founding Dean of the SPH at UMT, gave us a tour of the SPH's amazing campus, which includes superb classrooms/teaching technologies, well-equipped laboratories (beautified by students), an animal research center, and other aspects of the campus. 

School of Pharmacy at the University of Management and Technology is located in Lahore, Pakistan
 
 Dr. Ejaz Cheema, Founding Dean of the School of Pharmacy at University of Management and Technology (SPH UMT) in Lahore
 
With a PhD in Pharmacy from the University of Birmingham (UK) and more than 60 publications, Dr. Cheema decided to move to Pakistan and contribute to the field of pharmacy and the country's overall development. During that time, he has emphasized the empowerment and well-being of students. SPH places emphasis on community services where students routinely tour low-income and impacted communities and provide medical/humanitarian services, including education for diabetes prevention (Pakistan has one of the highest incidences of diabetes in the world), food distribution in rural/low-income communities, support to orphans, and other humanitarian causes. This program is in line with recommendations for community service by the Pakistan-based higher education body, HEC (Higher Education Commission).





Well-equipped laboratories at SPH UMT beautified by students
SPH also emphasizes innovative teaching/ pedagogical methods to advance excellence in teaching. These include flipped classroom methodology to improve scholastic performance. The results of their study were published in the leading educational research journal Cogent Education HERE.

Other achievements include the internationalization of the School of Pharmacy, the publishing of high-quality research, the launching of a peer-reviewed journal, and other accomplishments. As a result of their dedicated work, two SPH UMT students have won the prestigious UGRAD (Global Undergraduate Exchange Program) scholarship out of 37,000 Pakistani students who applied for this scholarship. We hope that SPH will inspire other institutions to follow suit.


Pharmaceutical Microbiology Laboratory at SPH UMT
North Carolina-based Local to Global Human Development is looking forward to supporting SPH UMT and similar institutions in Pakistan and South Asia to empower students and contribute to the well-being of society - the ultimate goal of all education!

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