Submitted to

Dr. Sara Sarwari

Associate professor
Department of business administration

Submitted by

Name ID
Sharaf Uddin Chowdhury BBA 06618927
Sadia Islam Rim BBA 06618937
Sadman Sium BBA06618924

Faculty of Business & Entrepreneurship

Department of Business Administration

The impact of COVID-19 on education in Bangladesh

The educational institutions have gone into unscheduled closures in response to WHO’s call for
international pandemic action such as, social distancing, home-quarantine, self- isolation and
lockdown to prevent community transmission of the disease. The outbreak of corona virus
pandemic has reached dangerous proportions all over the world and brought great difficulties
in its train. The prolonged situation is taking its toll on human lives, global economy and
education. UNESCO has given a ballpark estimate that 1.5 billion or more than 90% of the
students in about190 countries in the world are stuck at home. The highest ranked universities
like MIT, Oxford, Harvard, Stanford, Cambridge, Caltech, and Chicago are also laden with the
threat COVID 19 has posed to education.
Since there is a slim chance to get rid of the situation before long, the governments and
educators are grappling to work out a solution to the problem to help minimize the impact of
the calamitous situation on education. It has been suggested that an alternative mode of
education should be there for students placed on lockdown in a bid to ensure sustainability in
the academia. Because the closures of the institutions however temporary, must make them
suffer a major setback in the implementation of the academic calendar and plunge deep into
session jams.
Universities in Bangladeshi also have fallen victim to COVID 19 outbreak more or less. All
universities have been declared closed since 26 March 2020 and shall stay closed till September
2020 if the situation continues unabated, declared the premier herself. The private universities,
mostly run by tuition fees, seem to have been doubly affected by the pandemic. They are
anticipating huge financial losses to be incurred by nonpayment of tuition fees caused by the
suspension of academic activities and uncertainty about the upcoming summer semester
enrolment. The great bulk of tertiary level students are studying at the private universities
many of which may be threatened with continued existence by the financial crisis. Our
Education Minister Dr. Dipu Moni is deeply concerned about the problems besetting the public
and private universities and is using her best endeavors to overcome them. At a recent virtual
meeting with, among others, the Deputy Minister for Education Mohibul Hasan Chowdhury
Nowfel, UGC Chairman Prof. Kazi Shahidullah and the vice chancellors representing public and
private universities, she has taken half a dozen decisions in favour of maintaining continuity of
the academic activities at the universities by way of online teaching. These are all indeed very
good decisions and a successful outcome is not beyond the realms of possibility provided that
we have to act on them in right earnest clearing the hurdles we are faced with.
Though some universities have started conducting online classes on their own, we have yet to
develop any infrastructure for online education suitable for both the teachers and the students.
Besides, all the teachers are not skilled at taking online classes and many are even reluctant to
do it. However, to make them passably good at online teaching is no big deal. But to get all the
students connected to the Internet has appeared to be the biggest challenge. A large number of
public university students are fighting shy of the online measures on the pretest of being cut off
from Internet access and financial crisis. And it will not be very effective to run the online
teaching activities only with the ones who are willing to and who are inside the range of
Internet connectivity. The inequality of opportunity may dampen the spirits of the ones
dropped from the world of virtual education and thereby vitiate the true spirit of the
emergency academic move. The global experts are also apprehensive that the implementation
of online education system on a portion of student population, however larger, create
educational inequality and put poor students at a distinct disadvantage compared to their well-
off peers. This would be far removed from what is enshrined in UN’s Education For All (EFA)
objectives, Global Goals (SDGs)-4 (Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and
promote lifelong learning opportunities for all), and other education-related UN declarations
that Bangladesh conformed to.
The private universities, however, can conduct online teaching activities more easily. Their
students are mostly coming from well-to-do families and have the ability to buy all essential
tools and devices for virtual learning and examinations. But it will not be reasonable to draw a
parallel between the experiences of the private universities and those of the public. Nearly 70
percent of the public university students come from impoverished parents and are admitted to
the universities only on merit. Most of them scratch a living from private tuition which has also
come to a halt at the moment. To participate in the virtual classes they must have their own
devices and Internet access. How would it be possible for them to have a good reliable
computer or a laptop or even a Smartphone, the necessary computer peripherals and Internet
access at their own expense when they are in dire straits? How far are they mentally capable of
doing online classes under the shadow of gloom and depression caused by the financial
difficulties, the sudden discontinuity in academic life, the considerable uncertainty about return
to normality and the apprehension of delay in career?
As an instrument of social and economic development, online learning is fast becoming the
essential part of the mainstream education system. Mind-blowing developments in information
and communication technology have revolutionized the methods of education and research.
Yesterday’s education system based on the Dewey decimal library, the chalkboard and the
classroom is today’s ICT-enabled smart education. ICT has brought to us the facilities of online
libraries, the interactive digital whiteboards and the virtual classroom where students can
watch lectures at home on the computer. And all these are not new to education sector in
Bangladesh. Education in the country has thrived under the dynamic leadership of the Prime
Minister Sheikh Hasina. Her Government has successfully achieved the goals of Higher
Education Quality Enhancement Project (HEQEP), conducted Quality Assurance activities at the
public and private universities and is now working for the acceleration and transformation of
higher education through a project called HEAT (Higher Education Acceleration and
Transformation). In addition, she has established Bangladesh Accreditation Council with a view
to developing the quality of higher education in Bangladesh. However, the machinery of the
government for the promotion of higher education cannot be confident of a successful
outcome if the universities stay closed for so long and if something is not done to make up for
the loss.
Bangladeshi universities should adopt a down-to-earth policy on education in the time of
corona pandemic. We should not make overambitious plans to impose a system at the
universities overnight, nor should we gloss over the problem ignoring the ICT-mediated and
time-tested method of virtual learning which is essential in crisis situations of this sort. As a
matter of fact, the government has to strike a balance between the absolute necessity for an
alternative method of teaching and the practical problems, which is a slippery job though. To
bring all our public universities under one umbrella is a hard nut to crack. They suffer from
‘many men many mind’ syndrome and the older ones tend to reserve their rights to stay alone
on the pretext of having autonomy. That’s why a few months ago, the time-befitting bid for
introducing a central admission test system at the public universities ended in a divided
decision.
This is not also a major stumbling block. There is still plenty of scope for unity in diversity.
Despite their right to dissent, all universities, it is presumed, are motivated by a strong sense of
purpose and discharge their duties in their own sweet ways. So it can be expected that they will
see eye to eye with one another in regard to escaping from the clutches of session jams. And to
this end, they must not deny the necessity of a suitable alternative which ought to be online
teaching by all accounts. Given the gravity of the situation, this sounds quite reasonable. The
move towards online teaching can be implemented in two phases. In the initial phase, the
course teachers should manage to connect their students to any of the readily available online
platforms just to render student counseling services and conduct homework, assignments,
quizzes and other forms of assessment to prepare them for exams to be taken immediately
after the calamitous situation is over. That must be better than nothing. And in the final phase
the universities should fully develop an online education infrastructure professionally and
permanently which will run in parallel with the prevalent traditional system. They may be used
both separately and jointly as the situation demands to keep all the universities running.
Universities are like bicycles. If you don’t ride and keep pushing the pedals, they will fall. We
want our universities to continue to run, not to fall.