Staff Reporter:
State Minister for Primary and Mass Education Bobby Hajjaj yesterday stressed evaluating the long-term impact of ongoing reforms and development activities in primary education.
“Rather than infrastructure development or project implementation, how much students actual-ly learn in classroom should be the primary criteria for education,” he said.
Bobby Hajjaj made the remarks while speaking as the chief guest at a dialogue at a city hotel here.
‘Citizen Platform for SDGs, Bangladesh’ arranged the dialogue.
In his speech, the state minister said for a long time, efforts have been made to enhance infra-structure, technology, and administrative capacity under the Primary Education Development Programme (PEDP).
However, he said, the entire education system needs to be restructured more effectively, center-ing on student learning outcomes rather than merely constructing buildings or supplying equip-ment.
Addressing teacher management and long-term reforms, Bobby Hajjaj said apart from address-ing the teacher shortage, work is underway to bring recruitment processes, career progression, performance evaluation, and training under an integrated framework.
In addition, he said, plans are being formulated regarding primary school schedules, the imple-mentation of single-shift systems, and ensuring effective instructional time.
Noting the involvement of child psychologists and primary education experts in curriculum for-mulation, the state minister said the state bears the responsibility of ensuring the quality of edu-cation across all types of primary educational institutions in the country.
By developing the necessary manpower and capacity, all educational institutions will be brought under effective government monitoring at phases, he said.
Towfiqul Islam Khan, Additional Director (Research) at the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), presented a keynote paper at the dialogue with Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya, Distinguished Fel-low at the CPD, in the chair.
Faridpur-1 constituency MP Md Elias Molla, Nusrat Tabassum, MP (Reserved Women’s Seat), Director General of the Directorate of Primary Education Shahina Ferdousi, CPD Executive Di-rector Dr. Nazneen Ahmed, and Executive Director of Campaign for Popular Education (CAMPE) Rasheda K. Choudhury, were among others, present.
