My name is Arshad Mir. I was born in Pakistan but came to live in Leeds nine years ago. I'm currently researching nanotechnology at Leeds University.

In my opinion many children from a British Pakistani background, who were born in the UK, are not doing well in education.

I've not seen a lot of students from a British Pakistani origin who are going to university. Due to their bad A level results they can't get admission to the top universities.

There are many reasons behind this. I think the most important factor is the parents. They are not giving enough time to their children. They don't talk about education particularly.

Homework

I always encourage my children to study but I've observed many families here and they don't ask about whether the children have homework to do.

Arshad's eldest son is studying hard for his GCSE's

I think another important factor is that when the children come home from school they have homework but while their father knows English he is too busy to help the child with homework. The majority of mothers from Pakistan don't know much English to they can't help with homework.

90% Pakistanis

I've seen schools were ninety per cent of the students are British Pakistanis so you should consider that.

We should appoint bilingual teachers and they can speak to parents and students in English, Urdu, and Punjabi maybe. They would be good role models.

I think strongly this will be a big problem in the next ten to twenty years. When these school children become adults they will be a burden on the community.

Arshad's two eldest sons enjoy reading and attend mosque school regularly

Bad citizens

If they don't find a job they might well turn into bad citizens and use drugs and cause a problem for the police. When you have no other job to do then you do the wrong things.

I think the government should take some immediate steps.

If we don't tackle this problem these children will not be good citizens, they will be a problem for the community, a problem for their parents and a problem for themselves too.