UMAA and the Al Bayan Foundation are funding teachers at 14 schools, running an AI training lab in Skardu and planning Basha Valley’s first college.
SKARDU, Pakistan — In Basha Valley, a cluster of 19 villages in the mountains of northern Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan region, children have long finished primary school with nowhere to go next. Until recently, not one of those villages had a high school.
UMAA Global, a U.S.-based Shia Muslim nonprofit, is working to change that. With the local Al Bayan Foundation, UMAA is paying teachers at 14 schools in the predominantly Shia valley, building toward a high school and what it describes as the valley's first college, and running an IT and artificial intelligence training center in Skardu, Baltistan's main city, where women and men learn job-ready digital skills without leaving the region.
The aim is to give young people in Baltistan a path from the classroom to a career: schools close to home, college-level study inside the valley, and training and business connections that lead to work.
A donor impact report on the partnership, shared with the Shia Muslim Foundation, says teachers are already on payroll, an advanced IT and AI instructor is teaching daily classes in Skardu, and architectural drawings for the college are complete. UMAA and the Al Bayan Foundation signed a project memorandum for Basha Valley that set out specific commitments, including funded teachers and named school facilities. The report presents a ledger of that work and lists several items as standing or underway.
Basha Valley, in Shigar district of Gilgit-Baltistan, comprises 19 villages. UMAA President Dr. Azmat Husain has visited all 19 to assess schools, water access and healthcare, the report says. Photographs in the report show students at schools the partnership supports.
Teachers at 14 schools, and a high school underway
According to the report, 19 villages in Basha Valley had no high school before the program began, and children often finished primary school and stopped. The partnership now supports teachers at 14 schools that together serve about 700 to 750 households. UMAA is funding matriculation and higher secondary (F.Sc.) teaching posts at those schools.
A high school in Bain Basha, which the report says all 14 schools would feed into, is underway on donated land. Plans call for seven to eight classrooms, an office, a computer laboratory, a library and a chemistry laboratory.
The report also lists eight additional general teaching positions, budgeted at 30,000 Pakistani rupees a month each, or 240,000 rupees a month in all, as still under evaluation.
Plans for what UMAA calls the valley's first college
The partnership's most ambitious education project is a proposed college that UMAA and the Al Bayan Foundation describe as the first in Basha Valley. Architectural drawings dated July 25, 2026, by STB Construction Pvt. Ltd., outline a campus on about 11 kanal of donated land — roughly 60,000 square feet — along a link road, with the Basha River on its western boundary.
The plans show two academic buildings, an administrative building and two assembly areas, served by 16-foot internal roads. The academic facilities are designed for 16 classrooms, each 24 by 16 feet, plus physics, chemistry and biology laboratories, a computer laboratory, an examination hall and exam cell, a library, and administrative, finance and conference space. The report lists about 27,196 square feet of covered space across the three main blocks and says construction pricing is being worked out with the engineer.
The report’s timetable puts the college's opening in the first one to two years of the development plan, after a larger training facility and before a planned water and solar project. Once built, a local college would spare students the cost and difficulty of leaving the valley for higher education.
An IT and AI lab already teaching in Skardu
While the college remains in design, the Al Bayan Digital Skills and Economic Development Centre in Skardu is already operating. The report says an advanced IT and AI instructor has been hired and that the center runs daily classes for 25 women and 25 men, five days a week — 250 training places a week, including 125 for women. Courses listed as running include computer basics, graphic design, artificial intelligence, web development, web design, digital marketing, and search and research.
Photographs in the report show women in a full classroom at numbered workstations, each marked with an Al Bayan placard. The report says every seat is taken and that the classes are taught under the supervision of Dr. Husain.
UMAA describes the program as among the most advanced IT and AI classes for women in the region, and not a general computer-literacy course. “A woman from Skardu can now learn AI without leaving Baltistan,” the report says.
The organization said it planned to move the center into a larger facility that would triple weekly capacity to about 750 students and support a target of 3,000 training places a month. Job placement staff and a monthly business networking dinner are described as next steps tied to that expansion, so that, in the report’s words, “a graduate leaves the lab with a route into work.”
Other programs in Gilgit-Baltistan have also sought to widen women’s access to digital skills. Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper reported in October 2025 that 217 young women completed training in artificial intelligence, digital content creation and related technologies through a separate program at Fatima Jinnah Women College in Skardu. Germany's international development agency, GIZ, has also documented how technical training in digital services and freelancing has helped women from isolated communities in northern Pakistan pursue professional opportunities. UMAA’s center is a separate effort that pairs classroom instruction with plans for job placement and business development.
A planned business network
Beyond the classroom, UMAA says it intends to build a local Shia business network and connect entrepreneurs in Gilgit-Baltistan with its international business community. The report lists plans for monthly networking dinners with business presentations at the Skardu facility, a directory of Shia-owned businesses across Gilgit-Baltistan, and access to UMAA’s global network. Over a longer three-to-five-year horizon, the report describes a shift from teaching software toward helping graduates and local businesses grow.
Water, solar and community infrastructure
The Al Bayan Foundation has already undertaken clean water and humanitarian assistance projects in Basha Valley, according to the report. A further project, sequenced after the Bain Basha school work, would bring water and solar power to a village of about 80 to 100 homes in Deymal Valley, at an estimated cost of 7 million to 8 million Pakistani rupees.
The Shia Muslim Foundation said in a statement:
“Putting teachers on payroll in 14 schools, opening an IT and AI lab for women in Skardu, and planning Basha Valley’s first college is the kind of lasting investment Shia communities need. The Shia Muslim Foundation commends UMAA and the Al Bayan Foundation for this work.”
Additional information is available through UMAA Global and the organization’s Instagram video highlighting its Baltistan initiatives.
Sources
UMAA and Al Bayan Foundation, Donor Impact Report: The Economic Development Center (Skardu and Basha Valley), provided to the Shia Muslim Foundation.
Germany's international development agency, GIZ
