Masum Billah :
Our education minister says on time and occasion that honours and masters course are not necessary in all the colleges to produce educated unemployed. We rather want to turn population into manpower. It has been planned to stop honours and masters to run degree course gradually and initiate different types of diploma courses along with degree. Work is going on to this end and a committee has been formed. Ministry of Education puts forth the arguments that many students cannot manage job after completing honours and masters from non-government colleges and it creates a big gap between their expectation and achievement leading them to a state of despair.
The teachers who have been involved in teaching honours and masters in non-government colleges are about six thousand who are in tension as the discussion is going on to close down these course in non-government colleges. The leader of the teachers’ forum of non-government honours and masters’ colleges says that these courses have been going on for 28 years and there was no discussion about its closure. However, the government seems to take this decision when these teachers clamored for getting included in the MPO list that he terms as inhuman. He rather wants to continue honours and masters in the non-government colleges with MPO. The VC of NU says, in some colleges teachers are not given salary which proves difficult for them to continue these courses. So, it is better to keep the students in degree courses and these teachers will teach there and the students will receive some short courses as well. It will help them find a job or at least be able to earn their own bread. National University gave approval of opening honours and masters in 1993. Across the country 315 non-government colleges have academic recognition who are teaching more than seven lac students. When honours and masters were opened in these colleges, a condition was imposed that no teacher could ask for MPO.
We can remember that UGC raised the question of quality in 2014 after the publication of 41st BCS examination results. In that report on mass enrolment of students in masters was recommended to stop. The quality of the graduates coming out of non-government colleges is questionable. It’s true that the expansion of higher education has seen its big diameter but quality has been in question. However, the proposal of UGC has been protested by the students who advocate in favour of receiving honours and masters from colleges. They also advocated that all must have an opportunity to receive higher education if they desire. They term it as the government plan to shrink higher education. They are advocating on behalf of establishing infrastructures in the non-government colleges without closing the courses.
The government is giving importance to technical and vocational education that indirectly hints the shrinking of higher education. Non-government colleges offering honours and master courses have not been included in the last MPO list last even though secondary schools were entertained. We could remember that our education minister in an online experience sharing meeting on 29 December 2020 said, honours and masters courses are going to be closed in non-government colleges and it will be replaced by technical and vocational education. All those thoughts make sense considering the practicality but higher education definitely makes human beings more cultured, more refined and more humanistic. In order the develop these areas of humans ample opportunities should be made available to all who want to culture higher education even though without going to institutions regularly. However, quality must not be compromised at any cost.
(Masum Billah works as an education expert in BRAC Education and is President, English Teachers’ Association of Bangladesh).
