Overhaul the education system
Photo: AFP
Amid the poverty, political turmoil and violence, there is no more volatile place than the universities in major cities of Bangladesh. As the leading educational institutions in the country prepare students for jobs that do not exist, the university has become a breeding ground for hopelessness and frustration. Its walls and corridors are scrawled with giant, multicoloured political graffiti. Its teachers, fearing violence, lock the doors of their campus homes. Governments have come and gone and made claims on improvement of education but with no results. Education can only be improved by educationists who must realise the need for a change, then come together and start a mass movement to reform the existing education system. Reforms should be made by starting the semester system from classes IX to XII as well as in degree colleges. Making teachers regular, punctual and controlling copying are really difficult jobs and are major hindrances to improving education. In order to root out the hindrances, every district should be given the status of a separate board which should carry out daily inspection on a regular basis to keep check and balance over teachers while conducting examinations. Examining students in three hours after six months or one year is totally absurd. Marks, therefore, should be assigned to attendance, assignments and class participation. There should be a common but standardised syllabus throughout Bangladesh that contains more practical work. If we value independence, if we are disturbed by the decline of knowledge-based education, of values, of attitudes, which our present system induces, then we may wish to set up conditions of learning which make for uniqueness, for self-direction, and for self-initiated learning.
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