Dr Md Aktaruzzaman :
Over the last decade I have been following the ways the world top universities are operating their programs, contributing to their national economy and the way we do and/or contribute. Recently I have got an opportunity to visit several universities under a fellowship including Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Montana, and University of California Berkeley as well as many schools and colleges across the United States. These experiences and observations provided me the impression that we require a paradigm shift of our higher education today or tomorrow.
In the global commercial world, education is no longer a service only but also a business. Australia, Canada, USA or the UK bear the same philosophy – earning money for quality education. In a particular year between 2019-21, Australian universities contributed $41 billion to its economy and supported a total of 260K full-time jobs. Similarly, USA, Canada and the UK universities contributed over $36.9 billion, $55 billion and $95 billion to their economy and 450K, 700K and 815K direct or indirect jobs respectively in a fiscal year. What are our contributions in this regard?
The renowned universities in the US, Canada, Australia and the UK have shifted their strategy and are approaching to people with a range of blended and online education programs. Digital Bangladesh is implemented by 2021, now the platform is set to ensure meaningful, equitable and inclusive education as well as branding our education globally. Now it is the right time for us to think about our education future and its impacts or contributions locally, nationally, and internationally. Let’s see the different key aspects that can be adopted:
Thinking about jobs in time: We consider job opportunities after completion of Bachelor or Masters but in the USA students think about job from Grade-9 and complete a vocational course alongside their regular program such as certified nursing assistant, emergency medical assistant, IT front desk assistant, etc. before graduating from high school (Grade 6-12). Such system will help us learning while earning in the college or university and remittance earners becoming skilled before going abroad.
Ensuring proper utilisation of resources: Student number can be increased 2 to 3 times within the current setup of our universities through blended online modes. For instance, student and teacher ratio at Monash Australia and DU is 41.7 and 16.9 respectively. DU is 3 times better than Monash in terms of student-teacher ratio but not at all comparable in terms of rankings and student population.
National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF): In order to remain competitive globally, educational institutions need to participate world university rankings such as Times Higher Education, QS, Webometrics, etc. as well as we can make our own rankings like NIRF in India, US News in USA.
Introduction of 4IR related programs. 4IR related programs and courses need to be introduced at the undergraduate levels like BSc in Internet of Things, Cybersecurity, Data Analytics, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, etc. Market driven and skill oriented short courses should be considered even from the Grade-9 to Grade-12 in order to promote self-reliance through learning while earning.
Competency based curriculum: Each high school or college graduate irrespective of their education background should have a vocational component as part of their curriculum such as automobiles, cybersecurity, electrical wiring, video editing, etc. so that they can make their future plan effectively and even can create jobs for others. In the USA less than 30 percent of Grade-12 graduates goes to universities instead they go for vocational colleges followed by jobs. These college credits are counted, and students may come back to study two more years at the university to get a bachelor degree anytime.
No educated unemployed: Thousands of jobs opportunities in terms of teaching assistants (TAs) and learning advisors (LAs). The teacher task is to conduct the class of 50 to 100 students face to face while the 20 TAs or LAs will take care of the 500 remote online students. Online (asynchronous), hybrid (synchronous) or hyflex (both) are becoming increasingly popular globally. So there will be thousands of learning designers and technologists required at the universities for blended online education.
Higher education loan program (HELP): It is based on taxpayer income and program demand in the market at home and abroad. There may be several categories such as full-free, government-subsidised, and full-fee payment. In order to get the government loan or subsidies, parents or legal guardians of students should have income tax return cleared even there is zero return. After graduation, when the students will get job or self-employed, s/he must pay the loan gradually.
Increased international students and income: Our undergraduate education quality is comparatively better, so as it our teacher student ratio, but still we have poor rankings of our universities. Our two top institutions have 0-3 per cent international students whereas most of the Australian universities have around 40 per cent and thus, earning billions of dollars every year. When the universities will have income, they can bring visiting scholars from abroad. It will improve our graduate education and research, and the quality of publications and international exposures. A competitive environment needs to be created.
Strengthened industry-academia linkage: It is very important for sustainable program offerings job opportunities. We need to ensure that both industry and academia are in win-win situation. High quality labs, state of the art modern ICTs and blended-online mode could play a vital role. A national database of Bangladeshi-origin international experts in academia or industry may also be designed.
In 2041 Bangladesh is expected to be a developed country but it won’t be sustainable without having good educational institutions. Can’t we expect at least 41 of our public-private universities to respond to the challenges ahead and position themselves internationally by 2041? Now it is the right time for our policy makers to think about global branding of Education Bangladesh.
(The writer is a Blended and Online Education Expert and Fulbright & IPRS Scholar).
