In Bangladesh, although primary education is free and the government provides the textbooks, more than 4.3 million children aged 6-15 years are not in school and around 42 million people – about 26 percent of the population – are still illiterate. Moreover, while our school enrolment rate is still high, the dropout rate is even higher. Data from the Bangladesh Bureau of Educational Information and Statistics show that, in 2020, the dropout rate was 17.2 percent at the primary level, 35.76 percent at the secondary level, and 21.16 percent at the higher secondary level. Most of these dropouts happen in rural areas. Because the quality of schools and standard of teaching there are poor, many parents feel reluctant to send their children to schools. They find the current education system to be of little use in practical life as neither textbooks nor the curriculum is relevant to their situation or match the requirements of the present job market.
In the past few years, numerous experiments have been carried out in the name of modernising and updating our primary, secondary, and higher secondary education. Yet, the existing education curriculum is not aligned with industry needs. While schools/colleges across the globe are focusing more on soft skills such as team-building, problem-solving, critical thinking, communication, negotiation, decision-making, etc., our education system is still stuck in the past.
Bangladesh has a vision to become a developed nation by 2041 and to achieve that, we need skilled workers. But our education budget doesn’t reflect the urgency of developing human resources. Our current expenditure on education is the lowest among South Asian countries.
The Unesco recommends spending six percent of GDP on the education sector. Bangladesh ranked 112th out of 138 countries in the Global Knowledge Index 2020. It has scored 35.9 – again the lowest among South Asian countries.
We all know that education is a major driving force of development in any modern society, and that the quality of workers is the central determining factor of economic progress. Therefore, it is important for Bangladesh to focus on improving the quality of its education – the kind of education that will help individuals acquire the knowledge and skills to meet all the needs of the jobs of today and tomorrow.
Samprity Aid Foundation intend to contribute to the Government Goal and UNSDG through different project including special and inclusive education for the special children.
