Long holidays disrupt education in schools

Following 40 days of uninterrupted holidays on the occasion of the holy month of Ramadan and Eid-ul-Fitr, classes for the secondary section at Azimpur Girls School and College were supposed to resume from 9 April.

However, the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examinations started the next day and will continue till 13 May. This educational institute is an exam centre for students of six different schools from the surrounding areas. So, regular classes for the school students cannot be held consistently.

However, principal of the school Md Salah Uddin told Prothom Alo that classes of the secondary and college sections are being held on days when there are no SSC exams.

Sources concerned say that the Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) examinations will start after Eid-ul-Azha. Classes will also be disrupted because of the examinations at that time.

This unusual problem of classes being disrupted due to public examinations is not faced only by Azimpur Girls School and College but by thousands of other educational institutes across the country. There are no classes during major periods of the year due to various other holidays and uncertain breaks, in addition to the time of the public examinations.

As a result, it’s having a huge negative impact on students’ education. Also many students are moving on to next classes with learning deficiencies which will be impacting their later career as well.

Already there are complaints about educational institutes failing to provide desired level of education. On top of that, the damage is being multiplied countless times for the educational institutes remaining closed for long periods throughout the year. Student’s dependency on coaching centres and private tuitions is increasing as well.

Now, coaching centres and private tuitions are somewhat turning into a part of regular education. Bending the rules, many teachers are teaching students from their own schools in coaching centres or giving private tuitions to them in exchange of money.

However according to ‘Policy-2012 to stop teachers from doing coaching business in educational institutions’, no teachers of the government or private schools, colleges and madrasa cannot coach or give private tuition to any students of their own educational institutes. The teachers cannot even teach in any commercial coaching centres either.

But, the teachers are allowed to tutor maximum 10 students of other institutions a day in their own homes. Besides, they can conduct extra lessons for students, who fell behind, inside their educational institutes in return of fixed amount of money decided upon by the government. Nobody can be forced for that though.

While in reality, this policy is hardly ever followed. A number of teachers across the country are still giving private tuitions and teaching in coaching centres ignoring the policy.

No monitoring is noticed in this regard either. Such conditions are also contributing to increase discrimination in education. Students from affluent families are moving ahead while students from financially insolvent families on the other hand are lagging behind.

Though classes are suspended during public examinations, it is not listed as holiday in the annual holiday schedule of the academic year. For example, the issue of classes being suspended due to SSC examinations in thousands of schools across the country is not mentioned in this year’s list of holidays approved for public and private secondary as well as lower secondary schools. There are 76 holidays listed in this year’s holiday list but in reality there are even more holidays this year.

Deputy director of campaign for popular education (CAMPE), Mostafizur Rahman presented a research paper at a consultative meeting on the state of education and future thoughts organised by CAMPE last February. In it he highlighted the picture of the educational institutes remaining closed for major parts of the year.

This paper portrays the scenario over a 14-month period from August 2023 to September 2024. There were a total of 427 days during that time. Schools were open for only 148 days and remained closed for the remaining 279 days.

The number of days schools were open and closed each month during this period was also presented. For instance, schools were closed for 15 out of 31 days in August 2023. There were 18 holidays in January and 14 holidays in September last year.

Mostafizur Rahman told Prothom Alo that students’ education is naturally hampered and they suffer from learning deficiencies when schools remain closed for extended periods.

Sources related to the education sector say the impact of long holidays on education began to show more clearly after the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020. All educational institutions across the country were declared closed indefinitely from 17 March 2020 due to the pandemic.

Educational institutes in Bangladesh had never remained closed for such a long period. Though the government arranged online classes and telecast lessons on television as alternative methods during the shutdown, various studies showed that these were not very effective—and that nothing can truly substitute the classroom experience.

When the corona infection rate started going downward, it was decided to reopen the educational institutions in September 2021. Though the educational institutions were reopened, the classroom activities were running in a limited scale then. Not all the students were attending classes on the same day.

However, the government announced the educational institutes closed again on 21 January 2022 as the corona infection had experienced a fresh spike in rate. In the first phase the holidays were supposed to end on 6 February but later it was extended till 21 February.

Under such condition, students moved on to next classes every year along with their learning deficiencies. There are questions regarding how possible it is for students moving onto next classes without proper lessons and studies to do well in public examinations.

Controller of examinations at the Dhaka Education Board, professor SM Kamal Uddin Haider told Prothom Alo that the educational institutes have been directed to hold lessons for other classes on days there are no tests during the time of the SSC examination.  

Construction of buildings separately as exam centres for conducting public examinations is being proposed for a long time now. While there have been discussions about these buildings being constructed in upazila centres, it has never been implemented.

Principal of Azimpur Girls School and College, Md Salah Uddin believes it would have been better if there were separate centres for public examinations. Apart from public examinations, these centres can also be used for other educational purposes including holding various recruitment examinations, he added.

Sources involved in the education sector say that although there has been a sort of trend set about holding SSC examinations in February and HSC examinations in April, it’s not being maintained in the recent years. This too has appeared as another concern.

Since the secondary level academic year runs from January to December, some of those involved in the academic sector have also talked about considering the idea whether the SSC and equivalent examinations can be held in November and December with preplanned routine like the annual exams in school.

Emeritus professor at the BRAC University, Manzoor Ahmed has advised to find out alternative ways to put an end to unnatural amount of holidays in educational institutions. He said, now it seems that attending exams is the only task important and studying seems to have lesser importance.

The education board should take initiative to find out such alternatives that lessons of other classes are not disrupted during public exams or separate centres should be constructed for these exams. Additionally, brainstorming is needed on some way outs including change of academic year duration, he added.