Running Head: THE CURRENT EDUCATION 1

The current Education System of Bangladesh is not improving

Tasnim Bin Shahid

ID: 1631764030

English 105, Section 14

Professor Dr. Shireen Huq

April 16, 2018

 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 2

Acknowledgement

First and foremost I would like to thank my parents for their help and support. My deepest

appreciation to all the people who have participated in the survey, without whom I couldn’t have

completed the assignment properly. My special thanks to Fahim Faisal, Salwa Sumaiya and

Shabab Newaz for their help. Finally I thank Professor Dr. Shireen Huq for guiding me

throughout the whole process.

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Abstract

Education is a backbone of a nation. In recent years, some experts, students, teachers and parents

are concerned regarding the education system of Bangladesh. Comparing to the international

level of education, Bangladesh is lagging behind. The books that schools and colleges students in

national curriculum follow contain old and unusable contents. Most people agree that the schools

and colleges under Bangladesh system don’t focus on practical knowledge, rather they focus on

the result of students. Hence, the students don’t get the knowledge that they need in job sectors.

The quality of education depends on quality teaching methods, fairness in giving grades and also

whether or not the system is being consistent and regularly updated and not biased. Although

Bangladesh has been independent in 1971, it was under the rule of Mughal, British and Pakistan.

The paper presents the current condition of education system of Bangladesh comparing to

international level and give suggestions to improve it. The study also compares the current

education system after independence with the system followed during British and Pakistan eras.

The paper also analyses the problems in education systems.

KEY WORDS: Education system, Practical Knowledge, Job Sectors, Quality of education
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Table of contents
Topics ……………………………………………………………………….. Page
1.1 Introduction & Background …………………………………………………. 5
1.2 Statement of Problem ……………………………………………………….. 7

1.3 Hypothesis …………………………………………………………………… 8

1.4 Objective & Significance …………………………………………………….. 8

1.5 Literature Review …………………………………………………………….. 8

2.1 Data Analysis ………………………………………………………… 10 - 16

2.1.1 Survey ………………………………………………………………………. 10

2.1.2 Interview …………………………………………………………………….. 14

2.1.3 Secondary Research………………………………………………………….. 15

3.1 Summary of the findings ………………………………………………………. 17

3.2 Recommendation ………………………………………………………………. 18

3.3 Conclusion …………………………………………………………………… 18

References………………………………………………………………………… 20
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1.1 Introduction & Background

Education is necessary for the development of students’ knowledge and preparing

themselves for the service of nation in various job sectors. A nation’s development requires

improvement in various fields like industry, medical, research, agriculture, economy etc.

Students play vital role when they become professionals. Bangladesh as a developing nation

needs to improve in these fields. That is where importance in education takes place. But the

education system of Bangladesh is not good comparing to international levels. There are many

problems in Bangladesh education system. There are mainly 4 levels of education system in

Bangladesh. 1) Primary 2) Secondary 3) Higher Secondary and 4) Tertiary stage. Primary starts

from Nursery to Class 5. Secondary comes from Class 6 to Class 10. Higher Secondary is

College. I am mainly focusing on Schools and Colleges. Most of the other countries are

improving in education while we are lagging behind. Providing quality education is without a

doubt the biggest challenge. The ratio between students and teachers are not sufficient in both

schools and colleges. “Bangladesh’s present system of education is more or less a legacy from

the British” (Ali, 1986). At present, corruption is prevailing in all public organizations. Leakage

of question paper of the secondary level assistant teacher recruitment exam is one of the glaring

examples of corruption in the education sector. A strong syndicate is involved with this crime

which is leaking various government recruitment examination papers since 2003 (Rahman, 2010,

para 2). In Bangladesh, the main forms of corruption identified in the education sector include

more obvious forms such as bribery in admissions and in the disbursement of stipends; nepotism

in the recruitment of teachers; and corruption in procurement (Islam, n.d., para. 6). Corruption

creates social inequality and hence students get depressed and demoralized. Lack of

infrastructure development and lack of community development are some of the main reasons
 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 6

for corruption. (Islam, n.d.). Most students and parents value grades more than knowledge.

“Every year, just after the SSC and HSC results, smiling faces of students on the front page of

newspaper bring tears of joy in our eyes. But, at the same time, there are inconsolable stories of

heartbroken by unexpected results” (Majbahin, 2017, para. 1). In recent years, students have

committed suicide for not getting good grades. At least three schoolgirls reportedly committed

suicide in Chandpur and Satkhira in separate incidents on Sunday, over poor results in the Junior

School Certificate (JSC) exam (Chandpur, 2017). Four students of Feni, Gaibandha and

Shariatpur districts, who failed to pass the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) and equivalent

examinations, have committed suicide. (Four failed, 2017, para. 1). Five examinees committed

suicide over failing and poor results in the Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) and equivalent

examinations across the country. (5 HSC examinees, 2014). There are also Madrasa education

which focuses on only Islamic education. They don’t teach Bangladesh history, English literature

and language, no science subjects and no business studies. There are also controversy among

people whether or not they are responsible for creating terrorists. It is a bad thing to judge

without any reliable information. But it is also bad for focusing only on one subject as the

children can’t get opportunity to get knowledge on various subjects. Vocational education is

important type of education because it prepares students to work on various jobs. It should

belong to secondary education. In Finland, vocational education belongs to secondary education.

After the nine-year comprehensive school, almost all students choose to go to either a lukio (high

school), which is an institution preparing students for tertiary education, or to a vocational

school. Bangladesh also has this type of education but not with secondary education. The

graduation rate is also quite high in Finland – 93 % -- much greater than the US (Business

Insider, 2011). Students are forced to memorize. There is no creative method in learning.
 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 7

Memorization encourages cheating and discourages thinking and so the existing system produces

unthinking generations of cheating future leaders. Memorization is an ancient process of

learning. According the UNICEF, Bangladesh, the culture of memorization discourages students

tremendously and is a major cause of poor achievement and low retention. They also cite this as

a reason for high failure rates and repetition of classes which forces students to spend almost 9

years in primary school instead of 5 (UNICEF 2010). The government say they have established

a creative question methods for schools and colleges. But from my personal experience, this

method is ineffective as there is no creative about it. They provide questions from old books that

have many spelling mistakes and wrong information. Especially English version students in

Bangla medium face problems because most of the writers make mistakes when they translate

the Bangla words to English. They also miss out some points in English translated books that

were included in Bangla books. There are English Medium which follows British Curriculum.

They are more advanced in teaching method than National Curriculum. But they are being

ignored and underestimated by our society.

1.2 Statement of Problem

 Why is there corruption in education sector?

 Is there any biasness during exams like HSC and SSC?

 Why the students focuses on result rather than focusing on gaining knowledge?

 Are we following same education method which our ancestors followed 100 years ago?

 Is there any mistake or misinformation in the books that the students are learning?

 Is the change made by the educational minister really working to avoid plagiarism and

fraudulence?

 What are the other problems we are facing?

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1.3 Hypothesis

My main hypothesis is that the education system of Bangladesh is not improving.

Students become professionals after becoming an adult and finishing the academic education.

Although the government is changing some methods, but overall we are following same old

processes. If the system is corrupted the students will become corrupted professionals. We are

lagging behind in almost every sector and poor quality of education is one of the main reasons.

My research will aim on the present quality of education of Bangladesh. The quality of education

is one of the challenges for Bangladesh to face as a developing nation. There are corruption,

nepotism, lack of proper infrastructure, misinformation about various things, poor student-

teacher ratio, lack of coordination etc. Our education system must be improved by taking some

appropriate measures.

1.4 Objective & Significance

Education is important for a country’s development. It is important to be researched on. I

want to work on changing the system as a citizen of the country. By researching on it, I may find

the solutions that may benefit the sector. People on this sector may get encourage to further work

on it. It has been researched before, but not as much as necessary. The quality of education is a

vital thing for everyone to look on. Bangladesh is a developing country. We need to work on

improving the education system.

1.5 Literature Review

Paulo Freire in his Pedagogy of the Oppressed underscored teacher student relationship

from both end. According to Freire teacher student relation in the existing education system just

like banking system. The main aim of education hampers and students become less curious to

new knowledge and ideas. Historically, teachers just deposit knowledge to their depositor
 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 9

students and students just quote in memory without understanding the purpose of their study. In

the Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire indeed criticizes the current education system. He

argued that there should not have a syllabus of education and at the same time, education should

not be a tool of a particular group. Thus education should be for all. (Freire, 2005). VK Rao in

his Education System talked about quality control and quality assurance. According to him,

quality control is an oldest concept. It involves detection and elimination of component or final

products which are not up to standards. Quality control is carried out by quality professionals.

Quality assurance is different from quality control. Its concern is to prevent faulted occurring in

1st place. In education, there should be quality defect and fault free. (Rao, 2007).
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2.1 Data Analysis

2.1.1 Survey: In order to collect the data I took a survey from the students who studied in

different schools and colleges. I took a total of 35 surveys among which, 25 were online survey

and 10 Person to Person communication. 23 were Male and 12 were Female. The data collected

is presented and analyzed in the following:

In my 1st question, I asked the students from 1-5 how much they agree that education

system of Bangladesh is lowering day by day. 17 people gave score 5 which denotes as strongly

agree. 7 people gave score of 4, 8 people gave 3, 2 people gave 2 and only a person strongly

disagreed. It means that most of the people strongly agree that education system of Bangladesh is

lowering day by day.

In my 2nd question, I asked the students from 1-5 how much they agree that

education board is corrupted regarding board examinations. 17 people gave score 5 which

denotes as strongly agree. 8 people gave score of 4, 7 people gave 3, 2 people gave 2 and only a
 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 11

person strongly disagreed. It means that most of the people strongly agree that education board is

corrupted regarding board examinations.

In my next questions I asked the students if they think that the books used in schools and

colleges in their curriculum contained old contents or the contents that are not useful to them

anymore. 21 people said yes and 14 people said no. It means most of students think that books

that their schools and colleges used is not useful to them.

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Next question I asked was if they think that the institution teaches them things that are

outside the contents of the books. 26 people said no and 9 people said yes. It means majority

people think that their institution does teach things that are outside the contents of the books.

In my 5th question, I asked the students if they think that they study to gain knowledge or

to results. 29 people said they give priorities on the results and 6 people said they study to gain

knowledge. Although this depends person to person, I can analyze by saying that, most people

gave priorities on the results.

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In my 6th question, I asked the students if they think students with good results can

qualify in reputed universities or other institutions. 20 people said no and 15 people said yes. It

means there are some people who still believes that students with good results qualify in reputed

universities or other institutions.

My final question was if their teacher gives feedback to students based on knowledge and

not the results. 23 people said no and 12 people said yes. It means that majority of students’

teachers don’t give feedback to students based on knowledge.

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2.1.2 Interview: I took interviews from two people. One of them is an assistant professor

of Chittagong Sharaipara City Corporation and the other person is a top level manager at A-Z

Company. From the interviews I took some information that will help me to prove my

hypothesis. At first I took interview with Mrs. Shahida Begum. She is an assistant professor of

Sharaipara City Corporation College which is under the affiliation of Chittagong City

Corporation. According to her, there are general education, vocational education, Madrasa,

English Medium in Bangladesh. These curriculums lack coordination which creates

discrimination between them. At present, Science and Information Technology are given more

importance. Bangladesh education system is dependent on memorization. There are no social

values, the students are taught communalism under the name of spiritual value. She also told that

vocational education should be given more importance. But this education is being ignored in

our country. She also told that to get admission in reputed institution and in job, getting a good

result is not enough. Just by getting a good result in board examinations through memorizing will

not get them to admit in reputed institutions. Because in admission test and in job sector, they are

asked such questions that analyses their talents and skills. She added that the steps that education

minister has taken is not enough to stop leaking questions, bribery, nepotism. To stop leaking

question, the minister must take more appropriate measures. He can take help from Information

Technology to help stopping the question leak. She suggested that education system should be

properly coordinated. There should not be separate system. Education sector must completely be

under governments control and should open autonomy education system. Education system must

be unified by elites. I took another interview with Sahid Hossain. He is a businessman of Nabiad

Distribution. According to him if there is coordination in education system, the students will be

brought up with same mentality and there will not be discrimination. He also agrees that getting
 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 15

good results in Board examinations are not enough to get a good job. He admits that the

government that are taking measures against question leak is working at a measure and suggested

to keep working like that. He suggested that the system should change from memorization and

should give importance to vocational education. He also suggested that if students and teachers

stop focusing on results and study to gain knowledge, the education system may improve.

2.1.3 Secondary Research: There was another research based on this topic. It was by

Mohit Prodhan. The title of his research was “The Educational System in Bangladesh and Scope

for Improvement”. According to his research, he presented a critical analysis of education system

of Bangladesh. He has included infrastructure, teacher-student ratio, enrollment and retention,

emphasis on general education, method of teaching and evaluation, system of government and

comparative analysis of education system of Bangladesh with Finland. According to him, the

infrastructure of Bangladesh schools are very poor. The average ratio of student and toilet is

150:1. According to the data collected from World Bank, he analyzed that the teacher-student

ratio of Bangladesh is 1:44 whereas in Pakistan the ratio is 1:40, UK has 1:18 and USA and

Finland has ratio 1:14 each. In the first Five Year Plan of 1973 the enrollment goal was 73% (by

1978) which was only achieved in 1992 (First Five Year Plan 1973, BANBEIS 2010, DPE

2008). In 2010, the dropout rate dropped to 35% (BANBEIS 2010), a great improvement but

nonetheless, is still more than a third. According to the author, “As recommended by the latest

education commission there should be a drive towards vocational schooling. This would not only

provide a basic education but would also be in the interest of children who would otherwise

graduate from primary schooling without gaining anything from it for kick-starting their

professional life.”(Prodhan, 2016). As for method of teaching and evaluation, he claimed, “One

of the most unfortunate things about education in Bangladesh is the style of teaching.
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Memorization is standard way of learning. Teachers expect students to memorize a huge amount

of data and regurgitate them during exams. Courses are not designed to stimulate discussion and

analytical thinking in classrooms.”(Prodhan, 2016). He also stated that government is corrupted

in this system. The author also compared the education system with one of the top educated

country Finland. Finnish students’ performance in ‘Program for International Student

Assessment’ (PISA) examinations has been unbeatable (Abrams 2011). The national average

teacher-student ratio is 1:14 and in higher grades, in lab classes, which are a daily affair, the class

size is limited to 16 (Abrams, Business Insider 2011). The curriculum in Finland is also unique

and most innovative. The philosophy is to allow students to enjoy learning and to learn about

themselves and discover their potential. Their curriculum is also flexible. Students in Finland

spend less time in classroom studying. They get 75 minutes recess. The curriculum in Finland is

also unique and most innovative. The philosophy is to allow students to enjoy learning and to

learn about themselves and discover their potential. He also added that, “About 43% of Finis

students choose to go to vocational school after completing their high school” (as cited in

Business Insider, 2011).

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3.1 Summary of findings

Through collected data I have proved my hypothesis that education system of Bangladesh

is not improving. There are many things that are needed to fix. According to the survey, students

agree that education system of Bangladesh is lowering day by day. Education Board is corrupted

regarding board examinations. Students uses such books in schools and colleges that are old and

unusable for them. Some people may find useful, but education system should be in such manner

where everyone can get benefit from it. Most schools and colleges don’t teach the students

outside text books. Most of students give priorities on the results which give question on the

system that compels the students to study focusing on results and not to gain knowledge. Most of

the students agree that only results are not enough to get admitted to reputed institutions.

Majority teachers don’t give feedback based on how much knowledge students gained, they give

feedback only by looking at their result. By taking interview, I have come to know that there are

lack of coordination between different education systems. This is creating discrimination in the

society. The system is dependent on memorization only. The schools and colleges are not

teaching social values. The measures taken by education minister is not enough to stop

corruption in education system. Also it has been proven that only getting good results doesn’t

guarantee a student to get admit into reputed institutions. Students require talents and skills

which the system is failing to provide. Students should not memorize but should gain knowledge

from the text books. The books should also be written coherently and cohesively so that the

students can understand and well informed. The books should also be updated with new

information. In another research, prepared by Mohit Prodhan, I have found that Bangladesh

education system lacks proper infrastructure, poor student-teacher ratio, corruption,

memorizations.
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3.2 Recommendation

For improving our education system we need to give importance to vocational education.

It is everyone’s job to put a stop to corruption in education system. We must teach other things

that are outside text books but important for their future career life. Parents should at first consult

with children what they want to be as an adult and should be supportive to their decisions. No

one should force them to study science. We should not demotivate the students if they get bad

result. We should not force our children to get good results. Parents should realize that only good

results will not give them good jobs. So, students should not focus on results but should focus on

gaining knowledge. The students should participate in extracurricular activities besides

participating in classes. The education system should focus on increasing creativity of students.

So, it must provide students that way. Different education system must be coordinated under one

roof. Teachers must be given enough prestige and facilities so that they get motivation from it

and thus they may focus more on students’ future. The government may reduce question leak to

some extent but there are other corruptions and they need to take measure against it.

3.3 Conclusion

Education should be accessed for all and should be ensured with best quality. Bangladesh

needs to improve the quality of education. It is not only government’s job but as well as ours.

Every citizen should come forward for improving education system. We should change our

current education system in such a way that may benefit our later generations and thus become

well established professionals. We should demolish memorization process and develop creative

process. Nowadays, employers/corporations look for skills, qualities and experience; attributes

that aren't always captured by one's CGPA. In other words, your CGPA may get you to the door,

but it is not going to close the deal. (Sarwar, 2016). Declining quality in secondary education
 THE CURRENT EDUCATION 19

system, which is reflected in public examination results, remains a major concern (Rahman,

2010). The monitoring framework should set clear standards and recruitment and career

development rules that are based on quality. Funds should be utilized properly. Unless improving

education system we may continue to fail.

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References

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https://www.thedailystar.net/news-detail-162939

Majbahin, P. (2017, September 21). Education system of Bangladesh: knowledge or grades? The

Daily Observer. Retrieved from http://www.observerbd.com/details.php?id=95995

Khan, M. (2017, May 19). SSC Suicides: The Human Cost of an Education. The Daily Star.

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education-1407193

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https://www.dhakatribune.com/

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schoolgirls-suicide-jsc/

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%20in%20Bangladesh%20and%20Scope%20for%20Improvement.pdf

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https://www.academia.edu/34179619/Corruption_In_Education_Sector_In_Bangladesh