WB to provide $14.8 m for school sector response project amid COVID-19

A grant agreement has been signed on Monday between the government of Bangladesh and International Development Association (IDA) of the World Bank Group for an amount of 14.8 million US dollar from COVID-19 Accelerated Funding Window of Global Partnership for Education (GPE) at Economic Relations Division (ERD) in the capital, reports BSS.

“Bangladesh COVID- 19 school Sector Response” project will be jointly implemented by Ministry of Primary and Mass Education (MoPME) and Secondary and Higher Education Division (SHED) of Ministry of Education (MoE), an official handout said on Monday.

Secretary of ERD Fatima Yasmin and country director of the World Bank, Dhaka office Ms Mercy Miyang Tembon signed the agreement on behalf of their respective sides. The project has been approved by the World Bank Board on 20 October, 2020 and by Planning Commission on 19 January, 2021.

To strengthen the basic school system’s institutional capacity to recover from the COVID-19 crisis and to build resilience to face future crisis from pre-primary to secondary level are the main objectives of this project. Through this project, a total of 25 lakh children of pre-primary to grade 10 (12.05 Lakh Boys and 12.95 Lakh) will be supported with inclusive distance learning through 35 subject programs with complete and appropriate digital contents.

Remote learning system will be fully functional integrating with the basic school system. The World Bank has been providing support to mitigate the challenges due to Covid-19 pandemic and to overcome the possible consequences in economic sector.