Discourse on Modernity and Tradition in Madrassa Education

Despite being the torch bearers of the glorious tradition of Islamic learning and ethical training, the madāris have been the target of Western on slaught in modern times. As immense importance was given to the acquisition of knowledge in Islam, the early centers of Islamic knowledge were imparting education according to the letter and spirit of it, but with the passage of time that tradition could not be upheld. Though Qarawiyīn, Al-Azahar, Niẓāmiyah are a few classical madāris where religious and secular teachings were incorporated into one, the latter madāris separated the religious from the secular (worldly) education. Formation of colonial states made the condition worse. During the Afghan war, the madāris flourished in Pakistan but after 9/11 they were deemed responsible for the attack. The paper aims at producing a discourse on this transition of madrassa education from tradition to modernity and intends to suggest recommendations for the upgradation and revival of the educational system of madāris.

A Comparative Study of Self-Perceived Employability Among Employees and Organizational Performance in Selected Private and Public Sector Organizations Pakistan

This study analyzes Self-Perceived Employability attributes among employees and its impact on Organizational Performance of private and public sectors in respect of key supporting variables i.e. personal attributes, occupational attributes, subjective career success, professional commitment, and internal and external labour markets. The twenty first century recognizes tremendous benefits of Self-Perceived Employability Attributes as a key of success for employees’ better performance as well as for organizational development. After presenting a theoretical frame work; a conceptual model is proposed and tested with AMOS (Analysis of Moment Structure) statistic technique to examine the impact of self-perceived employability attributes on organizational performance. Disproportionate stratified random sampling method was used to collect data from employees of private and public sectors’ organizations of twin cities, Rawalpindi and Islamabad, Pakistan through a structured questionnaire. The sample size (n= 464) is selected from total population of this study. This empirical investigation uses regression analysis, Tukey Test for mean difference, and mean and standard deviation for data analysis with SPSS 15.0 version. The findings validate the proposed model with significant correlation between self-perceived employability attributes and organizational performance either in internal or external markets. This study, therefore strongly advocates the implementation of self-perceived employability attributes among employees for better organizational performance by means of improving employee’s performance either in private or public sectors. The self-Perceived Employability attributes have a remarkable and immense importance in developing countries and especially in Pakistan so that growing human inventory can be trained and effectively used for sustained growth and human development. Findings of the study support educational qualifications that play vital role to enhance self-perceived employability attributes. Furthermore, as qualification increases, the self-perceived attributes also boost up and then business education contributes more as compared to other categories of education. Eventually, organizational performance will also be enhanced significantly. In the light of regression analysis, the findings of the study significantly maintain training, especially during service, which plays a dynamic role not only to enhance Self-Perceived Employability Attributes but also organizational performance. It is generally observed that feminine gender shows better attributes than masculine gender. Table 4.70 favours that private sector considers Self-Perceived Employability more important for better organizational output than the public sector. Thereupon, the findings of the study support self-perceived employability attributes which significantly enhance organizational performance for achieving sustainable development and competitive advantage.