Manzoor Ahmed

Education allocation in Bangladesh budget for FY 2023-24

Education lags again in funding and action

The new budget has not displayed cognisance of the need for post-pandemic recovery and remedial actions.

23h ago

The problem is not with coaching centres or ChatGPT. It's with our education system.

AI and edtech can be helpful for our students in an inclusive manner when the plans and programmes in this respect recognise the basic and long-standing weaknesses in the system.

1w ago

Is a policy directive enough to stop school bullying?

This isn't the first time that regulations and directives have been issued by education authorities regarding bullying. The question is if and how the new directive can make a difference.

3w ago

Are there any lessons for Bangladesh in Ashoka Mody's ‘India Is Broken’?

Both countries have had a single-minded focus on GDP growth, with not enough attention to jobs, climate, the distribution effects and the destructive impact of crony capitalism.

Is research university an oxymoron?

Cultivating research mindset and critical thinking among students is important, but does this require foregoing the necessary academic routine of “teaching a course, administering tests, and grading students”?

Protecting a generation in danger

Two recent studies under government auspices have confirmed the warnings given by Education Watch.

The textbook debate: Managing the politics

Curriculum and textbook renewal is not and should not be something that has to start from scratch.

Education and growth: Are we asking the right questions?

Economists and policymakers, influenced by economists, tend to look at education as a homogeneous and highly aggregated category.

Graduate unemployment: Who's to blame?

The populist remedies for youth and educated unemployment will not work without a coherent and coordinated plan from the government.

‘New year, new curriculum’ cannot transform our school education

Throughout 2022, education authorities focused on returning to a “normal” routine, making minimal adjustments mostly in organising public examinations.

A rudderless education policy is leading us astray

Is there a pattern of incompetence, inefficiency, lack of accountability, and impunity among the education personnel and institutions in this country?

Inflation is yet another blow to education recovery

A 200-page notebook that cost Tk 40 four months ago now costs Tk 50

Can teachers be the pivot of change in education?

To ignore the special role of a teacher in society is to place the future of the nation at peril.

Ailing Democracy: Rx Intensive Care

Biden’s “inflection point” applies to Bangladesh, too.

Is education another commodity in the market?

The important issue that must be discussed is whether school education should continue to be another commodity subject to the vagaries of the market.

An explosion caused by a police munition is seen while supporters of President Donald Trump gather at the US Capitol Building in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021. File photo: Reuters

Democracy on life support

The political division regarding how to deal with the attack on the US Capitol Building does not augur well for democracy in the US. What does this tell us about the fate of democracy in the world?

Can a new law solve our educational problems?

The National Education Policy 2010 anticipated a comprehensive education law that would bring together existing laws and regulations under an umbrella to facilitate implementation of the policy.

Education in budget 2022-23: Small mercies and dashed hopes

Educators and concerned citizens have been urging a major increase in public allocation for the education sector.

Put education back on track

Educators in these columns have been asking for recovery and remedial actions to overcome the pandemic-induced learning losses that threaten a generational learning disaster.

Building social cohesion: How can education help?

French sociologist Emile Durkheim described social cohesion as organic solidarity arising from peoples’ dependence on each other in a modern society.

The playbook of student politics needs an overhaul

The tragedy of two innocent by-standers’ lives squandered, hundreds injured, shops damaged and burnt, and business worth crores of taka during the

Unpacking the story of missing students

The Annual Primary School Census (APSC) 2021 shows that enrolment in primary schools came down in 2021 from the previous year by almost 1.5 million, while the number of teachers decreased by over 83,000.

50 Years of Brac: An education legacy lighting the way

It hardly needs saying that the towering personality of Sir Fazle Hasan Abed left its indelible mark on Brac’s vision, mission and programmes in all the areas of development in which the organisation has been engaged.

Learning loss from Covid-19: Can a generational threat be averted?

The United Nations has called it the “longest disruption to education in history” worldwide. In Bangladesh, schools remained closed non-stop for 543 days from March 17, 2020 to September 11, 2021.

Schools should remain open—then what?

Schools re-opened on September 12 last year on a limited basis after 542 days of closure.

Campus in Turmoil: The playbook must change

A sadly familiar playbook has been on display once again at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST). Students have been on “fast-unto-death” in front of the vice-chancellor’s residence.

Should Covid caution supersede learning loss action?

On September 12, 2021, schools in Bangladesh reopened after 18 months of Covid-19 closure—partially, with restrictions.

Our education in the next 50 years

It has been a season of reviewing and reminiscing about the past 50 years since independence and projecting into the future with expectation and hope.

Education and The Pandemic: The ostrich syndrome is not the answer

The proverbial ostrich buries its head in the sand in the face of danger, assuming that if it cannot see the hazard, the hazard does not exist or will disappear.

PECE Exam Board: What it says about decision-making in education

The Ministry of Primary and Mass Education has doubled down on its insistence not only to continue the nationwide Primary Education Completion Examination (PECE) at the end of Grade 5, but giving it a permanent institutional form by proposing the establishment of an examination board to conduct it.

Improving education needs the right kind of political strategies

The elections held in the US in the first week of November this year had state and local representatives, including two governors, mayors and school board members, up for selection.

Teachers also need support for learning loss recovery

We all can recall from our student days one or more teachers who touched our lives in a special way. They inspired us to aspire higher and served as our role models.

Children’s learning and wellbeing, not testing, should be the priority

Examinees of PECE, SSC and HSC will attend in-person classes every day while the rest of the students will go to school once a week after schools and colleges reopen on September 12, Education Minister Dipu Moni announced on September 5. The SSC and HSC exams are planned to be held in November and December, respectively.

The politics of mass literacy: Where we stand

On the occasion of International Literacy Day, proclaimed by the United Nations in 1966, there will be pronouncements with much fanfare about the vital role of literacy in national development and the progress that has been made.

What Bangladesh can learn from the reopening of US schools

About 56 million children in 130,000 primary and secondary schools in the United States, including about six million students in 30,000 private schools, are returning to a second school year this autumn under the spell of the pandemic,

500 Days of School Closure: Averting a generational catastrophe

UNESCO has called the learning loss caused by the Covid-19 pandemic “a generational catastrophe.” What does it mean, and how can we cope with it?

Education budget ignores the pandemic

The education community’s plea for breaking the pattern of Bangladesh having the lowest public spending on education in South Asia and among developing countries has fallen on deaf ears.

To open or not to open schools

Since schools were closed due to the pandemic on March 17 last year, the closure has been extended 17 times.

Four steps to reopening schools and recovering learning losses

The second wave of the pandemic has hit life and livelihood hard and has thrown us all into deep anxiety. For 40 million students,

Can we prevent a potential collapse of the current education system?

The second wave of the pandemic has crashed onto Bangladesh and other countries, including India, after a downturn earlier in the year, dashing the hope for a waning of the pandemic.

Reclaiming our foundational values in education

On the 50th year of its birth, Bangladesh has crossed the bar to join the ranks of developing countries. It aims to be a developed country in two decades.

Building on Bangabandhu’s education vision

On October 28, 1970, in his address to the nation on national TV and radio channels prior to the 1970 parliamentary elections of undivided Pakistan, Bangabandhu enumerated the continuing disparities in education.

Finding a new trajectory for education

As we step into the second decade of the 21st century and Bangladesh is poised to become a middle-income country, a pertinent question about the education system may be whether the glass is half-full or half-empty.

A blueprint for school reopening and learning recovery

In 2018, the UN General Assembly proclaimed January 24 as International Day of Education to celebrate the role of education for peace and development.

‘A teacher at last’: The story not told

It was reported in the press that a teacher who topped the list in the primary school teachers’ recruitment examination 12 years ago did not get the job.

Make school calendar child and learning friendly

Is there a good reason why the school year should begin in the first month of the Christian calendar other than that this is how it was done in the colonial era? In India, school calendar is a state (provincial) matter, but the year mostly begins in June.

US elections: Toxic populism challenges democracy

Mark Twain reputedly said that God created wars to teach Americans geography. It can be said that God put Donald Trump in the White House to teach America how to protect democracy.

World Teachers’ Day: Time to rethink teaching to salvage our education

Does Bangladesh education need salvaging? The official narrative is equivocal. Most young children are in primary school. The system has expanded to comprise 40 million students, over 200,000 institutions, and over a million teachers. Girls and boys are equally enrolled in schools, a feat not achieved by many developing countries. We do need to work more on improving quality. So why is the despair?

June 2, 2023