Mentioning the new generation of boys and girls as very talented, the Minister of Posts and Telecommunications, Mustafa Jabbar, said that by giving them the opportunity to learn with digital devices and content, they will be able to exceed the global standards in education. And so he commented that digital devices with digital content, digital connectivity and digital classrooms are essential for students.
He said, there is no alternative to change the infrastructure of education in the education system as well. Every student from primary to higher education needs a digital device with digital content in their hands to create smart people. The days of receiving education by merely attending the institution are over. The government has taken initiative to introduce blended education system. The Minister mentioned that if this initiative is implemented, there will be a revolutionary change in the transformation of education.
The minister expressed his view while speaking as the chief guest in the program titled ‘Mass literacy campaign, learning experience and future direction’ jointly organized by Save the Children and Friendship at the Bangabandhu International Conference Center in Dhaka on Thursday.
The program was presided over by Aroma Dutta, one of the founders of the Mass Literacy Campaign Council and a member of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Ministry of Social Welfare. Rasheda K. Chowdhuri, the advisor to the former caretaker government and the executive director of the Mass Literacy Campaign. Chairman of National Curriculum and Textbook Board Professor Md. Farhadul Islam, Country Director of Save the Children Anno Van Manen, Professor Emeritus of BRAC University and Principal Researcher of Education Watch Dr. Manzoor Ahmed, Senior Director of Friendship and Head of Education Program Brig. Gen. (Retd.) Elias Iftekhar Rasul, Jamalpur District Primary Education Officer Mizanur Rahman, Kurigram Rajarhat Upazila Education Officer Nazrul Islam, Dhaka Mohammadpur Thana Education Officer Mumtaz Begum and students, teachers and parents of various educational institutions of Kurigram, Jamalpur, Dhaka spoke in the program.
Introduction, achievements and prospects of the program were presented by Shaheen Islam, project director of Save the Children’s Empowering Girls through Education (EGE) program and associate professor of Education and Research Institute of Rajshahi University Dr. Happy Kumar Das.
Describing his own experience in establishing Ananda Multimedia School in Gazipur in 1999 as a private initiative and establishing 32 other multimedia schools across the country, the minister said, after the paper age, it is time to move to the digital age in education. The nation will benefit greatly if digital content and digital devices are introduced alongside paper books.
He also said that a project funded by Social Responsibility Fund of BTRC is being implemented for the digital transformation of public primary school education in underprivileged remote and hard to reach areas under the initiative of Department of Posts and Telecommunications. Under this project, 650 primary schools and 28 neighborhood centers of hilly Chittagong are implementing digital content teaching programs on digital devices. During the inspection of the project activities, the Minister of Posts and Telecommunications expressed the experience of the project in primary schools and neighborhood centers in remote and deprived areas of the country. There is a demand to provide digital content in schools which have computers. The minister said that the digital content of education is the standardized interactivity of conventional syllabus for teaching on digital devices, images, audio, video, animation,
As shown in the project evaluation in the main article at the event, the program was launched with the aim of helping girl students to successfully complete their primary school education and to assist them in getting admission to secondary school. Under this programme, 12536 girl students of class IV and V of 120 schools in Kurigram and Jamalpur are supported in Bengali, English and Mathematics education using digital-content through virtual learning platform before and after class time. As a result, a survey on the program showed that the number of primary school graduates under the EGE program compared with other local primary school students, The number of primary to secondary enrollments and the number of successful transitions from one class to another have increased to almost a hundred percent. Also surprisingly the number of child marriages below 18 years has come down to zero (0).