Project Overview

In Bangladesh, attending primary school is compulsory and provided free by the Government. Although initial enrolment is 100% and shows gender parity, children from poor families still can face limited access to education and health facilities due to a number of factors including high population density, profound discrimination against females and poor social and economic infrastructure. Corporal punishment is still operating in schools in Bangladesh and is discouraging to children to attend school.

Teachers are often inadequately trained, lowly paid, and have huge class numbers. Another one of the factors limiting the access of poor children to education is the culture of paid tuition provided by their classroom teachers out of school hours which favours children from more prosperous families who not only receive extra learning but also receive more attention in the classroom.  This discrimination means that poorer children are unable to keep up academically and contributes to the high drop out rate.

This program has been developing initiatives to provide learning opportunities for children who have been alienated from the system by providing parents with an activity they can manage, involving them in the school management process, and assisting local schools in adopting innovative and high quality teaching, learning methods and materials.

Project Progress

The Community Learning Action Project has been changing the culture of learning in Bangladesh and given a voice to children, their parents and their community.

Plan Bangladesh has devised a range of educational interventions for children from pre-school through to the end of primary school. Young adults from the communities are trained in child-friendly, participatory learning techniques for out-of-school hours groups of pre-school, grades 1-2 and grades 3-5. They have also been running Learning Camps that have been extremely successful and teaching children in an interactive, fun and punishment free environment.

Community participation is encouraged through involvement in community learning committees that monitor the quality of programs and support other initiatives such as parenting programs. It has also been successfully working towards making all classrooms punishment free. 

This project is supported by a grant from AusAID, the Australian Government Agency for International Development and donations from the Australian public.