Study hours reduced by 80 percent: BIGD

Study hours of students in the country have declined by 80 percent due to school closure, said a survey report of Brac Institute of Governance and Development.

Since schools closed, the total time students spend studying reduced from 10 hours to 2 hours a day, said BIGD, an affiliated body of Brac University.

BIGD presented the survey outcomes in a webinar yesterday, said a press release.

A team of researchers surveyed over 5,000 students from urban slums and rural areas across Bangladesh to learn how children are coping with school closure and if "remedial measures" of virtual learning are working, said the release.

The education system in Bangladesh lacks quality education for 40 million children enrolled in schools, BIGD said in the release.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated this learning crisis as all educational institutions have been closed for over two months with no immediate plans for reopening, it said.

The study showed only 16 percent students watched educational programmes like "Ghore Boshe Shikhi" and "Amar Ghorey Amar School" on television.

Of the students who watch the programmes on TV, majority did not find them helpful. Besides, only one percent students watched educational programmes on the internet.

Findings suggest that after schools shut down, the percentage of children who spend more than two hours a day working for the family's economic needs has increased from 4 percent to 16 percent, it added.

In addition, the percentage of children who work two hours or more a day doing household chores has also increased from 1 to 13, BIGD said, adding that though these findings are primarily from rural areas, students in urban slums also present a similar picture.

Prof Niaz Asadullah of University of Malaya, who was part of the research team, presented key findings at the webinar.

He said rural children were now spending double the time behind household chores.

BIGD Executive Director Imran Matin said, "Our country's core strength has always been community-based innovative approaches and therefore we must utilise this core strength to tackle the many challenges of the pandemic, be it in designing social protection programmes or in generating digital innovations in education."