WHEN the authorities claim cent percent enrollment in primary education, a shocking picture was surfaced where number of student in primary schools is decreasing day by day. In 2013, some 1.96 crore students were enrolled in government primary schools, which came down to 1.73 crore last year.
As many as 5,036 government primary schools have fewer than 100 students, several news outlets reported recently. Of them, two schools have fewer than 10 students, 23 schools fewer than 20 students and 446 schools fewer than 50 students. Is slower population growth is the key factor here? No, we don’t think so. That’s not the only reason.
Many parents send their children to privately-run schools, including English-medium ones, for better education. Besides, many religious-minded and low-income people prefer madrasa education for their kids. In many government schools, the infrastructures are very poor and classrooms are overcrowded and also, the number of teachers is inadequate. We often observe that, a section of teachers always remain busy in different movement to force authorities for increasing their salaries and other benefits. They give less time to the students. This may be another reason for decreasing students.
As of last year, there were 1,33,901 government primary schools, Ebtedayee madrasas and kindergartens across the country. Of them, 7,764 schools had only three teachers; 721 had two and 79 were run by a single teacher. So, those who can afford other options are not interested in sending their children to these schools with poor infrastructure and inadequate number of teachers. In the past some dishonest teachers, school management committees and field-level education officials allegedly provided inflated figures of enrolment to get higher stipend from the government. However, it was later stopped and the enrollment figures started to come down.
There is no question at all that country has made a remarkable progress in expanding the primary education. But our education system is not yet pro-poor. It’s very much appreciating that government has given highest importance to the education sector to ensure education for all. The education is highly financed in Bangladesh where a large portion of the national budget is kept aside for education. So, the poor condition of the primary schools is undesirable.
