Agriteam Canada - Building Capacity and Opportunities for Change

• Home
• About
• Expertise
• Projects
• Employment
• Contact

Bangladesh, Rangpur District, Complementary Sector Reform: Strengthening the Teaching of English and Math in Secondary Schools: April 2005–June 2010

Purpose

To help the Government of Bangladesh undertake policy, institutional and systems reforms required for a higher quality, more holistic, poverty-focused, inclusive and equitable education system, complementing primary and secondary investments in education.

Challenge

Educational development activities in Bangladesh have been successful in improving certain educational indicators, such as the enrollment of girl students. However, the performance of students within the education system remains a cause for concern, particularly in math and English. With large-scale initiatives targeting primary and secondary education, the junior secondary level was selected as a crucial, yet neglected, transitional step for students.

Approach

Agriteam has worked collaboratively with the Government of Bangladesh and CIDA to develop and implement an innovative model of teacher professional development.

Project Description

The CSR: STEMS Project is being implemented over 2.5 years with 90 schools throughout Rangpur district. Direct beneficiaries in each school include four class six and seven English and math teachers, their head teachers, and two representatives of each school’s management committee. The project has divided the 90 schools into two cohorts, working first with 45 schools, and then replicating activities with the second 45.

CSR: STEMS is piloting an innovative model for teacher professional development. The model consists of three short training sessions, each followed by classroom practice and intensive school- and cluster-level support by the project’s school support team (SST). The activities of the SST help to ensure transference and implementation of training contents, and allow teachers to receive ongoing guidance as they refine their practice of student-centred instruction.

Results

• Training and support has been provided to the first cohort of 45 schools, including 180 class teachers of English and math, 45 head teachers, and 90 school management committee members.
• The teacher professional development model and all requisite materials have been developed and refined.
• After one year of school-level implementation, students have improved their end-of-year test scores by an average of 32%; student attendance has increased by an average of 11%; and class six (transition year from primary school) enrollment has gone up by an average of 16% in project-supported schools.

Technical Coordinator

Matthew Hiebert
matthewh@agriteam.ca

English | Français