Reimagining post-Covid primary education

Bangladesh was quick in response to the educational challenges brought on by the pandemic in 2020, initially through Ghore Boshe Sikhi, and then through Bangladesh Betar. Meanwhile, NGOs, and the civil society came forward to address its related challenges, primarily to reach the unreached. Multiple surveys indicate that a small proportion of households (10-21 percent) in Bangladesh benefitted from some remote education, and there were differences, between poor (15 percent) and non-poor (26 percent) households (c.f. SANEM 2021, BIGD&PPRC 2021). A Brac study on feature phone-based remote learning suggests that children in junior classes (Classes 1 and 2) had better learning outcomes compared to their fellows in more senior classes (c.f. Evana and Swarna 2020). Other studies on school closures during the pandemic indicate that the learning loss effect reflects on the cumulative impact of knowledge learned (c.f. Per Engzell and Mark Verhagen, 2021, BIGD & PPRC 2021).