Time to evaluate EFA performance

Fatima Khan Basu and Asad-Uz-Zaman Asad (From previous issue) At the same time, 21% percent of the households with a monthly income under BDT 1, 250 can hardly spend anything on education. Household expenditures amount to over 60% of public expenditure per student in primary education. Second, even if school if 'free' and does not have direct costs associated with it, families may risk losing the children's income by sending children to school. * Third, often, illiterate parents lack the motivation to send their children to school (Shahjahan & others, 2006).According to BBS, about 22.9% of the country's total child workers are forced into different hazardous jobs as they cannot find any better form of employment and go into the vocation given the financial hardship of their families and having to earn for the family. Around 66.8% of child workers are sent to these jobs by their parents. Almost 45% child workers could not attend school because they could not afford educational expenses and 19.5% of them could not go to school due to work. Among the total non school going child workers, 9.8% reported that their parents did not send them to school (BBS, 2006).Distance to schools is claimed as the most significant barrier to children's (of Chittagong, haor/ wetland, coastal area, extreme north of Bangladesh) education, despite a national policy, which aims to provide a primary school within two kilometers of each child. Till date, the state has exerted little effort to expand access for geographically, ethnically and socially marginalized groups including the 'char'-inhabitants, tribal minorities and urban slum children.* On supply side, the government has difficulty in meeting its commitments for capacity or quality, including school infrastructure, number of teachers and access, mostly due to budget constraints. The government has increased its gross funding for education, yet education expenditure in Bangladesh is one of the lowest in South Asia and lowest among the developing countries. Moreover, public expenditure in primary education shows a downward trend. Total public expenditure in primary education as percentage of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) fell steadily from 1.09% in 1993/ 94 to approximately 0.81% in 2003/ 04. In 2003/ 04, total expenditure in primary education and GDP was BDT 27, 608.40 and BDT 13, 541.23 million respectively (Hossain, 2006).Towards achieving the target of the Universal Primary Education (UPE) by 2015, GoB has commenced on the PEDP-II (Primary Education Development Program-Phase II) from July 2003 to 2009 Fiscal Years. The key objectives of the PEDP-II are to increase primary education access, participation and completion in accordance with government's National Education Policy (NEP) 2000, Education for All (EFA) process and other relevant policy commitments. Under the PEDP-II, Government primary schools, Registered Non-Government Primary Schools and Community schools are given a basic package of teaching aids, core and supplementary reading and learning materials, teacher training and a 'supply of teachers' to fill temporary vacancies. And even, the PEDP-II points to the fact that at the end of the project in 2009, the net enrollment ratio will be 88%, completion rate for class five will be 80% and acceptable levels of literacy and numeracy will be only 50%. This means that education for all is still a far away dream as still 1.8 million children will be out of school, and even the PEDP-II is far behind fulfilling its targets (Shahjahan & others, 2006).4. Policy RecommendationsPolicy Recommendations for Bangladesh in order to reach the unreached, marginalized and underserved in Education- * Access to Schooling for the Disadvantaged Groups: A more progressive redistribution of government primary education spending to the children of poorest and disadvantaged groups and a better targeting of the primary stipend program to the poorest students, are likely to help Bangladesh achieve its EFA targets.* Motivate community and parents towards education: Not only enhance the activity of SMC (School Management Committee) also take various attempts to ensure the more active participation of community people and parents in school activities. * Quality of Primary Schooling: Improving the overall quality of schooling is a pressing task in order to substantially raise enrollment and help more children complete primary school with the appropriate skills in literacy and numeracy. * Improve Teacher Quality and Incentives: Hiring local teachers and providing opportunities for training and professional career growth is critical. Further, building an internal incentive structure within the school system to reward performing teachers is likely to be sustainable.* Learner-centered learning process: Ensure learner-centered teaching-learning processes for the students.* Curriculum and Textbooks: The concept of 'life skills education' linked to national priorities for sustainable development and lifelong learning should be incorporated into the national curriculum. Improving the quality of textbooks and transparency in the distribution of textbooks is likely to help the learning environment. * Improve Facilities: Despite decades of infrastructure development, a large number of classrooms and local administrative facilities need to be repaired and/ or renovated.* Metropolitan Areas: The pervasive poverty in metropolitan areas and the lack of access to education for many children, including those from indigenous groups, signal the pressing need to tailor the stipend program to the most needy and meritorious students. * Decentralize the School System: Developing information campaigns on the delivery of services and resources from the central government to local schools to empower local communities would be instrumental in improving the quality of schooling and learning outcomes. * Improving Governance in the Bangladesh Education System: Transparency teacher recruitmen

19 June, 2013 Wednesday

Time to evaluate EFA performance