A ray of hope for char children
Char Bhagabatipur is a remote shoal village along the Brahmaputra river basin area under Jatrapur union in Kurigram Sadar upazila where nearly 500 families reside.
Though the char village had a primary school and three madrasas, there was no high school previously.
As a result, after passing primary level most of the students of the village could not continue their studies further.
In order to reduce the number of dropouts, Kurigram district administration took a noble initiative and established Char Bhagabatipur High School in January.
The newly established high school, which has a total of 130 students and four teachers, started its academic activities from last month.
Kurigram District Education Officer (DEO) Shamsul Alam said the dropout rate is pretty high as most of the char villages do not have high schools.
There are about 400 char villages along the Brahmaputra basin areas in Kurigram, and every char village has at least a primary school or a madrasa or both.
But there were only six high schools in as many villages, the DEO said.
Farmer Naya Mia of the village said it is quite difficult for the char children to go to a high school in the mainland for studies.
Therefore, after passing primary level most of the char kids could not continue their studies any more.
"Now we have a high school at Bhagabatipur and it will surely help our children get their high school education," Naya said.
Kohinoor Akhter, a class VI student at the newly established school, said her education would have stopped if the institution was not established at the village recently.
Now her parents are also dreaming to provide her higher education, she added.
Another Rozina Akhter, an eighth-grader, said she was admitted to a high school in the mainland, but could attend her classes regularly due to a lack of transportation facilities.
Rozina now attends her classes regularly with a dream of higher education.
Yusuf Alamgir, a member of the school management committee, said the infrastructure of Char Bhagabatipur High School will be developed gradually.
One of the teachers of the institution, Farooq Ahmed, said they are giving lessons on voluntary basis.
Kurigram Sadar UNO Rasedul Hasan, also president of the school management committee, said he hopes the school will flourish with the support of people from all walks of life.
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