Rubaiya Murshed

Rubaiya Murshed is a PhD researcher at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge. She is also a lecturer (on study leave) at the Department of Economics, University of Dhaka.

How we assess education matters

The competition aspect of educational assessment is meant for students to be ranked against their own prior achievement, not against their classmates.

Curriculum and textbooks as weapons

Does “simplifying” the curriculum really guarantee that children will not be able to pace themselves in higher studies?

Ethics, happiness, and mental health for education

When a student is in a place of despair, on the brink of taking their own life, what does one do as a teacher?

Is education only about earning money?

We need a peak in social consciousness, and not just in our GDP.

University: Our factory of miseducation

Universities should be about creating the next generation of thinkers, right? Even in terms of skills, haven’t we been failing largely?

TVET and our skills ‘fetish’

There is an inherent bias in our thinking when we imagine the aspirations and career trajectories of students from different socio-economic backgrounds.

School choice: Celebrating, not eliminating, variety

We rarely think about the fact that individuals studying under different education streams may have different perceptions of what being educated means and may have different educational goals and aspirations.

Educating education: An academic's two cents on education reform

Today, students are still subjected to, more or less, the same so-called education that we or our seniors experienced.

January 2, 2021
January 2, 2021

Young people can change the system, but they need better guidance

“Won’t you change your birth year?” my class teacher had asked with a confused look. She was processing the paperwork for changed birth years in our class nine cohort, and amidst all the “new” 1992s and 1993s, I was one of the two “original” 1991s left.

June 23, 2020
June 23, 2020

Nobody’s children

June 12—World Day against Child Labour—wasn’t supposed to be just another Friday. It would have been the launch day of my first book, containing stories about street children.

June 9, 2020
June 9, 2020

For their childhoods

Growing up in a joint family had its perks. For example, there was hardly a chance to get bored. On the rare occasion I did get bored, I vividly remember my mother threatening to make me memorise my time-tables if I complained. It was a much dreaded punishment. It makes me wonder how the children are coping in this pandemic.

June 2, 2020
June 2, 2020

To go or not to go online?

As my students entered the exam hall, their faces were a tad bit more tense than usual. I was nervous myself. I would finally find out whether our efforts to make the course different had been a whopping failure.

May 13, 2020
May 13, 2020

What changes do we want in a post-pandemic Bangladesh?

”It’s going to be a long night,” I thought to myself as I pressed the redial button for the fourth time.

January 4, 2020
January 4, 2020

Bursting our bubble

As we bade farewell to the teens of this century, most of us—if not all of us—must have been looking back on our changes, gains and losses as a person, as a society and as a nation.

November 9, 2019
November 9, 2019

Setting our priorities straight

When job seekers look for new employees, they need a system to filter out the best candidates. Indicators of potential or skill are a key component.

October 31, 2019
October 31, 2019

Weighing the ‘why’ behind education

I once faced a question from someone I would have never imagined it to come from. It was a humid afternoon and we had assembled under the large banyan tree on the green

July 1, 2019
July 1, 2019

Dhaka University’s ‘nervous nineties’

The University of Dhaka has achieved a lot in these 98 years, and it has played a pivotal role in structuring the country’s economy, politics, society and development. Through the many scholars it has given birth to, the university has made inspiring strides in different fields and has taken academics substantially further from the point it was at almost a century ago.

January 2, 2019
January 2, 2019

For a homeland they would love to return to

We grew up in a joint family. I'm the eldest of the girls, and have always felt like I have to set an example for my two little sisters. So, nine years ago, when I was the first of us to get a national ID card, I was beyond excited.

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