A newly launched facial recognition attendance system for teachers and non-teaching staff in Sindh government schools encountered technical failures on its first day, prompting employees at several Karachi schools to fall back on manual attendance registers.
The Facial Recognition Attendance Monitoring and Evaluation System, known as FRAMES, entered its pilot phase on Monday across six districts: Karachi East, Hyderabad, Naushahro Feroze, Jacobabad, Ghotki and Umerkot. The pilot covers 49,565 teaching and non-teaching employees.
At Idara Sharqia Government Girls Secondary School in Jacob Lines, Karachi, teachers trying to mark attendance through the FRAMES mobile application encountered repeated error messages, including “Server is busy, please wait a few seconds and try again” and “School not assigned to user.”
Multiple attempts to log attendance failed, and efforts to reach relevant authorities for a resolution went unanswered. Teachers were ultimately forced to record their attendance manually.
The malfunctions raised concerns over the systems readiness as authorities work to replace the paper-based attendance process with a digital mechanism intended to improve transparency and curb absenteeism in public schools.
Under FRAMES, employees are required to mark attendance upon arrival and departure using the mobile application, which verifies identity through facial recognition and logs attendance times.
The system is designed to function without an internet connection and also allows staff to submit leave applications and download monthly attendance records through the app.
Speaking to the media, teachers said the initiative could improve transparency and help identify employees drawing salaries without regular school attendance.
They noted that the official reporting time is 8:15am and that most teachers arrive before the deadline, adding that the digital system would create an immediate record of punctuality and absenteeism.
Idara Sharqia Government Girls Secondary School in-charge Muhammad Khawar called the initiative a positive step, noting that it gives teachers an opportunity to become familiar with new technology. He said similar digital systems should be extended to other government institutions to improve administrative transparency and efficiency.
Teachers and school administrators said they hoped the technical issues identified during the pilot would be resolved before the system is expanded further. According to the plan, pilot results will be reviewed before FRAMES is rolled out in phases across Sindh.
