Bangladesh’s Progress in Primary Education: Enrollment and GenderParityMr. Bablu Rahman (Bangladesh)
In a developing country like Bangladesh, which is one of the most promising emerging
economies, it is absolutely crucial that investments be made in order to groom the labour forceof tomorrow. Accordingly, achieving universal primary education is the second United Nations
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The country spends less than three percent of its GDP for the education sector. In thenational budget for the year 2013, the education sector got the third largest allocation
amounting to Tk.25, 114 crore.

There are nearly 16 million girls in Bangladesh, which accounts for 10% of the total
population. It is highly important to bring up young girls in Bangladesh as educated women. Ifa cost-benefit analysis is done, the benefits will certainly outweigh the costs.
Educating women will not only lead to increased household incomes and contribute towards
building a more skilled labour force, but will also make these individuals more socially mobile.
However, it is common practice for rural households not to send their young daughters toschool as they believe females are born solely to run households. But this idea is changing
gradually in rural areas along with the socio-economic progress in Bangladesh.

Bangladesh has certainly made remarkable progress in expanding the primary education,
especially in raising the enrollment rate for students and bringing about gender parity,achieving the literacy rate of 70% as of 2016.
UNDP statistics show that Bangladesh achieved Human Development Index (HDI) rankingof 142th among 188 countries in 2015 whereas it ranked 137th among 177 countries in 2006.
The enrollment rate was 57.46 percent for males and 42.54 percent for females in 1999. But
the rate for males has decreased to 51.52 percent, while for females it increased to 48.48 percent
in 2003. The gender gap in enrollment rate has been gradually reducing. This is because eachfemale student from sixth to tenth grades gets stipend from the government and other donor
agencies. The government also provides tuition fees to the schools for each female student.
The gender gap was even much wider two decades ago. Such progress in female participation insecondary education is mainly attributed to the female stipend programs in rural areas ofBangladesh. The implementation of these programs would therefore result in the elimination ofgender disparities in the primary and secondary education as called for in the UN Millennium
Development Goals. The facilities must be accessible to the poor and females.
But it has been found that many parents give priority to an arranged marriage for theirdaughters instead of completing the secondary level education, and this is reckoned as one of
the main causes of dropout of female students.
A research conducted by Asadullah, M, N. and Chaudhury, N (2006) has revealed that thegender disparity in education in Bangladesh has different dimensions along with career paths
for females which, to a certain extent, are linked with social, religious and economic values ofBangladesh.
In the metropolitan area, there was an increasing trend in enrollment per school, while adeclining trend was registered in semi-urban and rural areas from 2001 to 2003.
Dr. Bjorn Lomborg, President of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, says in an article thatthe great progress in primary education in Bangladesh over recent years is the reason why thecountry has met the two Millennium Development Goals related to primary schooling: universal
enrollment and gender equality.
There are 63,601 government primary schools in Bangladesh, where the number ofstudents is 21,932,638, whereas that of teachers is 322,766.
Bangladesh Bureau of Educational Information and Statistics (BANBEIS) published asurvey report in 2014, which indicates that 68% girls and 57% boys have enrolled in secondaryschools. But 47% girls have dropped out of school, whereas boys’ dropout rate is 35%.
The UNDP Human Development Report 2015 put Bangladesh in the medium humandevelopment category with 142nd position out of 188 countries. The Human Development Index(HDI) measures a country’s average achievements in basic aspects of human development. It isa summary measure for assessing long-term progress in three basic dimensions of humandevelopment: a long and healthy life, access to knowledge and a decent standard of living.
Between 1980 and 2014, Bangladesh’s mean years of schooling increased by 3.1 years andexpected years of schooling increased by 5.1 years. Bangladesh improved one step in HDI torank 142 globally, up from 143 as per the UNDP Human Development Report 2014.