Youth Culture : Educational Reform
A write-up in a national daily has said “WHEN a few years ago I wrote about the importance of an English education in our lives, I ignorantly expressed my views from a narrow English medium mindset. Incidentally, after four years of an American education and once again returning home, I have started realizing the importance of all three kinds of education in a Bangladeshis life -- Bengali medium, English medium, and the madrassah system. Having gone to English medium schools most of my life, I was always conscious of the ever-present gap in peer association between the students from the three types of educational backgrounds and the supposed superiority of an English medium school education. I cannot remember any extra-curricular events, national, religious or even political affairs that ever brought us in contact with our peers from Bengali medium schools and madrassahs during my school years. I would swear that there was a distinction even in the minds of my family members who attended either Bengali schools or madrassahs. In their view, we were the all elitist, fast society children with no roots or pride in either our religion or our nation. “ The writer goes on “In 1972, when Bangla became the official language of the newly independent nation of Bangladesh, it was also the official medium of instruction in all schools and colleges. At the same time small, informal, private schools came up, initially to preserve English at the school level and especially for the children of the diplomats. The introduction of madrassahs came about even before the time of the British, in about 1197 when the first Muslim leader of Bengal, Ikhtiaruddin Muhammed bin Bakhtiar Khalji built a mosque and madrassah in his capital Gaur. Many of us go away to Europe and America, seeking a unified education system and live styles which somehow seem more familiar to us than the one in which we were born. And it is thus not surprising that few of us rarely ever choose to come back to this nation, a nation whose reality we never really had a connection to begin with. “ We feel that our education requires a lot of reform. There should be one main stream with some minor streams The present curricula in school system and Madrasah system can be easily unified up to class ten on the basis of Dakhil course ( equivalent to O level/ ssc ) which combines necessary language ,humanities and science education with Islamic education. If this has to be general curricula, option has to be kept for Non-Muslim students in respect of half of the courses based on Islam. In any case this requires thought of all in a cool manner and beyond political considerations The spreading of London or Cambridge university Level and A level schools is un warranted Why should there be so many such schools ?They produce a generation who has no liking for our history and values ( whether in geographical, ethnic or religious sense ) as mentioned by the writer of the write-up mentioned above.They also do not produce generally better students compared to the general stream .Still the social life of Bangladesh is dominated by students of our national school system
