Under Friendship Education Programme (FEP) Implemented by

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1 Primary Education Project for the unprivileged children Of Gaibandha, Kurigram, Patuakhali and Satkhira Districts (combined with adult functional literacy courses) Under Friendship Education Programme (FEP) Implemented by Baridhara Central Plaza, 3rd Floor, Block K, 87, Suhrawardi Avenue, Baridhara, Dhaka Bangladesh [email protected] Supported by

2 Introduction Friendship Education Programme operates in the riverine char areas of northern and southern Bangladesh where people have hardly any access to services due to the remote location and unpredictable condition of the chars. The programme is one of the major programmes in the char areas in addressing the need for sustainable development of the char population. It promotes discovery-based, interactive primary education. It intends to create a significant change in those areas through developing primary education and life skills, as well as civic sense, awareness amongst the community for their right of education, and social education useful to the society and to their family. Friendship started its Primary Education Programme in 2005 with 10 schools in 10 islands of Gaibandha and Kurigram Districts with the goal of providing primary education to the children and functional literacy to the adults of those chars. Friendship is organising and implementing the education programme based on the Active Learning Methodology of FIVDB (Friends in Village Developpement, Bangladesh), an education specialist organization which is providing technical support and training to staff, teachers and communities.. Friendship s approach to education in hard to reach areas is based on innovative and effective approaches to increase access to education, as well as to develop an infrastructure for proper education service delivery. Primary educational services (formal and non-formal), satellite schools, child to child peer education and vocational training for adolescents are some of the key components of Friendship s interventions for spreading education in the char and riverbank areas. Friendship primary school in Patuakhali District (coastal area) 2

3 The Friendship Education Programme has achieved remarkable success. At the 2011 Primary School Exam (an exam which is organised at the national level under the responsibility of the government) Friendship primary school students achieved a 100% success rate for the first time in the char areas. Moreover, 71% students scored A Grade. Again, at the 2012 session 100% of the Friendship primary school students (657 students in 30 schools in Gaibandha and Roumari) passed with flying colors. This time 91.9% got A grades (A+, A, A-). Never in the history of the char communities has there been such an achievement. This comes as an outstanding confirmation of the quality of Friendship s education program and has been made possible by the hard work and dedication of altogether the students, the parents, the teachers and the entire project staff. In the year 2013, a total of approximately students will be enrolled in Friendship primary schools whereas approximately 1200 adolescents and adults will be enrolled in functional literacy courses. Friendship s approach to education in remote areas Friendship s approach to education in remote areas is explained in more detail in Annex 1 hereto which can also be downloaded from 3

4 Scope and origin of the programme The present project document and related budget covers (i) the continuation of 37 existing schools, (ii) the running of 16 new schools and (iii) the introduction of a second shift in 18 existing or newly created schools. Out of the 53 schools covered by the programme, 6 are run as full primary schools whereas the remaining 47 are presently run as satellite schools (see Annex 1 for the concept of satellite schools and full primary schools). Depending on the child flow and on the funds that will be available to Friendship, certain of the present satellite schools may be turned into full primary schools by the recruitment of further students. In that case, the number of enrolled students will increase and the budget will have to be adapted accordingly. Apart from primary education, the project encompasses adult and adolescent education. While students of primary schools benefit from a full 6 year education cycle, adult education/functional literacy courses consist in year wise courses (including orientation, assessment test & results) with new students being recruited after each course. Thus the number of beneficiaries of adult and adolescent courses is significantly higher than those of primary education when looking at an entire education cycle. Apart from the schools included within the present programme and related budget, Friendship is presently operating 21 further schools. Altogether the primary education programme of Friendship will, during the year 2013, host a total of near to students. Out of these, near to will be part of this programme and related budget. 4

5 Detail of schools covered (a) From January 2008 to the end of 2012, Friendship has been collaborating with Char Livelihoods Programme (CLP) of DFID to implement a non-formal primary education programme in the communities residing in the remote char areas of the Roumari and Ulipur Upazilas of Kurigram District, since 1st January, The project had been managing twenty satellite schools in 20 chars with 595 students who had successfully taken their Primary School Certificate (PSC) exam at the end of It was a pilot project of CLP. While the funding from CLP has come to an end, CLP has proposed to hand over the existing infrastructure to Friendship who will thus continue running the school with the teachers in place. Considering that the students who have previously been to these schools have exited the primary school cycle at the end of 2012, new students have been recruited in these schools. (b) In the same area (Ulipur and Roumari of Kurigram District) 12 new schools have been built in the last trimester of 2012 and are hosting new students as from January In the 32 satellite schools mentioned in (a) and (b) above, 18 will host a double shift because of the density of students who will otherwise not have a chance to benefit from primary education. (c) 6 full primary schools and another 6 satellite schools have been operating in 6 Chars of Kurigram district since As from 2013, these schools have been integrated into the present education programme and related budget. (d) Another five satellite schools, which have been run since 2011 as part of another program, will be integrated into this programme. 3 of these are located in Kurigram District and two are located in Pathuakhali (South; coastal region) where Friendship has become active after Sidr cyclone which struck the region in (e) Finally four new satellite schools have been started in Satkhira District (South) as part of this programme. Satkhira district, especially Shamnagar Upazila, is an area particularly exposed to disaster. The coastal side and Sunderbans forest make the area very remote with little communication and transportation facilities. Thus, the people of these areas are suffering from lack of access to health and education facilities just as the communities which Friendship is already serving in the char areas. Friendship has initiated health services for the unprivileged and vulnerable communities in the area by implementing 80 satellite clinics. The construction of a land hospital will start in the area in As Friendship looks at development in an integrated way, it has decided to complete its health services activities with educational activities. 5

6 f) List of Schools: A full list of the schools operated under this programme, and their precise location, is included in Annex 2 with an indication whether they operate as satellite schools or as full primary schools. Learning and training methodology Duration of Academic Activities The model and curriculum are designed to provide six academic years of basic education (Shishu/Pre-primary Class V). Allowing for about two months of disruption due to flood every year and other vacations and holidays this allows 8 months of academic activity in each class. Schools operate 6 days a week (excluding public holidays) with 3 hours a day for Shishu class II, and 4 hours a day for classes III V. Therefore, two shifts per day can, where adequate be programmed in one classroom and with a single teacher. 6

7 Age group for enrolment The project enrols children aged 6+ in the Shishu classes. The same set of children will progress through classes I to V. Initially each class enrols an average of 30 children (maximum 35, minimum 25) depending on the settlement patterns where it may be difficult to find 30 children in some communities while some communities may have more than 30 out-of school children in it. Adult and adolescent functional literary courses enrol age groups which are no more eligible for primary school teaching. Adolescent and adult classes enrol 20 learners per class on the average. Curriculum and materials FIVDB s curriculum is based on the National Curriculum and Text Book (NCTB) Board. Active Learning at FIVDB uses NCTB books for its primary classes. Text books are, to a large extend provided to Friendship by the government. Teacher pre-qualification and development For the programme there were 43 trained teachers available for 37 schools; another 16 teachers have as far as possible been newly recruited from the very communities in which the schools are located. Training and capacity development Given that Friendship Education programme employs teachers with low level prior skills and qualification, emphasis is put on intensive and structured support for their capacity building. Teachers receive basic training before they start teaching as well as on-job training like refreshers and subject training and capacity development support through academic supervision and monthly follow-up workshops. The teachers training are structured as follows: Training type Shishu class Initial Teachers Training Refresher & Subject Training 2 weeks Class I Class II Class III Class IV Class V 2 week 2 week 2 weeks 2 weeks 2 weeks Teachers recruited for replacing turn-over during on-going academic year will be given a one week on-site orientation by the project management and quality assurance team. They will be provided more intensive support until they are brought in for the next Refresher and Subject Training. 7

8 On-going supervision and monthly follow-up training The teachers are supervised on a weekly basis. Besides administrative monitoring and counselling, the supervisors are providing on-site problem solving and mentoring support to the teachers. Each month teachers of the schools will be brought together for a monthly follow-up training. These workshops are aimed at experience sharing and solving of problems which had been identified to persist in spite of classroom support. Emphasis of these supports is on guided practice and peer-learning among the teachers. Learning Assessment Learners assessment is individualised and incorporates both formative and summative assessments. Each child is assessed on an on-going basis by their teachers based on lesson competencies. At the end of each class year the learners are given a summative test. The ongoing formative and summative assessments determines the learners progression to the next level and help teachers determine and design the support required for each child at the next level. Role of communities The community members are intensively involved in day-to-day management of learning centres. A seven member School Management Committee is formed with representatives from the community including at least two women in the new 12 schools. They assist the project team with regard to learner and teacher attendance, classroom activities, maintenance of centre resources and site etc. The communities are provided orientation on their roles and responsibilities and groups of SMC members are provided with the opportunity to visit other SMC periodically both within the project area and outside. 8

9 Listen2Learn Project: improving English teaching with innovation and simple to use technology. At the start of this new project was the insight that the char students (and teachers) learn the theory of the English language ( the grammar, the vocabulary, a.s.o.) but the practical side is missing completely. They don't speak English regularly, they don't hear English being spoken outside their school lessons, which are taught in Bengoli. They miss the rythme, the pronunciation, the "music" of this language. Thus the idea arose to provide the schools with a collection of English audio records matching the teaching program which would allow them to keep alive the sound of the language. The recording collection comprises the full text book contents from class 1 to class 5, children songs and rhymes, plus short stories from children's every day live. For the more advanced students there are pronunciation lessons and English pop songs where the text is relatively easy to understand. All in all there are 366 recordings, or 520 MBytes, summing up to more than 19 hours of recording material. A Friendship volunteer, though not an English speaking native, lent her voice to the recordings with an authentic British accent. Another volunteer took care of the technical aspects of the recording sessions using a Macintosh computer with standard software. The recording studio was mainly done in the Friendship Training Center in Gaibandha. The mobiles are supplied together with a small speaker system (on battery also) to allow the recordings to be played in class. While the mobile alone should be used by the teacher to prepare the lesson at home (repeating for himself the pronunciation), connecting a speaker will enable all the students to hear English language in class. Why chosing a mobile phone to record all this material? Because mobile phones are very popular in Bangladesh and their basic handling is well known. It was merely needed to provide some training to show the more advanced features of the phone and to explain the correct use of the recordings in class. These recordings should in no way replace the interactive role of a teacher in front of the students. It should help to pronounce the words in correct English. A teachers guide is set up to show when and how to use the new technology during class lessons. One of the challenges in the project was to plan for the electrical charging of the mobiles and the associated speakers. Some of the teachers have solar panels on their private roof, while others have the possibility to recharge the devices at a neighbour's solar panel. In all these cases we had to provide the correct cabling and chargers. Still others may not have any electricity on their char. In this case they would have to recharge the device while joining to the monthly Teacher's Follow-up Training in Gaibandha. Friendship is also looking into developping a low cost, small solar panel without batteries to provide the required electricity supply during day time. The project listen2learn has been received with great enthousiasm by the techers and the supervisors. After just a couple of weeks of implementing the project in the chars, a big improvement of the pronunciation could be noted, Also,during the trainings it can be noted that teachers speake English more fluently and with less inhibition. 9

10 Monitoring indicators Monitoring indicators are in the areas of Teachers and learners attendance, Teachers following appropriate teachinglearning process, teaching-learning resources, classroom organisation and management. School Supervisors visits to school and support provided to teachers and community. Learning outcome individual at centre level and aggregate at management level. Formative and summative assessments forms the basis of learning outcome indicators. SMC members regularity in meeting attendance and kind of support they generate in relation to identified issues. Management and Supervision Structure The teachers are intensively supervised in their conducting of lessons to mitigate the effect of low entry level qualification. Considering the difficulty of communication in the project area one School Supervisor will supervise 5 7 learning centres (average taken as 5.5 centres per supervisor). The specific number assigned for each Supervisor will be assigned jointly by the Project Manager and Programme Manager from Friendship Head Office. The school Supervisors are supervised by the Project Officer and Project Manager for their administrative regularity and learning achievements. Head Office monitoring team will provide quality monitoring support to the field project staff through monitoring process inputs like classroom organisation and management, teachinglearning process, teachers handling of classroom, use of learning resources, learner assessment; and outcome indicators like learners achievement. Head Office Monitoring team will comprise of a Programme Manager, Assistant Programme Manager and Programme Officer. The project team is closely supported by the Finance and Administration Unit of Friendship for administrative management and financial control. 10

11 Project Organogramme Executive Director Director Operation Asst. Director (Programme) FIVDB Technical Team Accounts and Finance MIS IT HR Admin Procurement Communication Technical Department M&E Maintenance Department Services Driver ICC Sr. Programme Manager Education and Policy Analyst Programme Manager Material and Curriculum Specialist Programme Officer Accounts Officer Project Manager Project Officer Accountant Project Officer SMC Supervisor Office Assistant Teacher Adult Literacy teacher SMC Supervisor Supervisor Adult Literacy teacher Teacher Accountant Office Assistant Office Guard Office Guard Shyamnagar Project Office, Satkhira Roumari Project Office, Kurigram 11

12 Budget and Cost A budget is given in Annex 3. Total cost of the project running, including all overhead cost, as well as maintenance cost, for 2013 is approximately BDT, i.e., at an estimated exchange rate of 102BDT/EUR, EUR. Even not taking into account the fact that part of this cost is dedicated the adolescent and adult functional literary courses, the per child cost of primary education in a Friendship school is thus approximately 100 EUR per year. 12