ICT-based education
Since multimedia
classrooms make learning effective and enjoyable to the students, Bangladesh needs to spend more
on them
In this age of high-tech and computerised world, there is no alternative to turning more and more towards an ICT-based education system. In order to keep pace with the world and to achieve the desired development in all sectors, Bangladesh must put greater emphasis on educating students in such a way that would prepare them to meet the challenges of the 21st century. In fact, the present governments aim to create a digital Bangladesh cannot become a reality unless schools and colleges located at the far-flung rural areas do not have equipment and skilled teachers to teach students the required knowledge and training on computer.
On the 13th founding anniversary of Khulna University of Engineering and Technology, the Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid on Thursday informed that a total of 23,350 educational institutions of the country now have multimedia classrooms. The achievement is notable but it is expected that the coverage of multimedia class rooms would be expanded to include all the educational institutes of the country. Since multimedia classrooms make learning effective and enjoyable to the students, Bangladesh needs to spend more on creating such modern classrooms.
There is no denying the fact that more people in the country are using internet and mobile phones. It means that more people are becoming tech savvy. According to the education minister himself, currently 10 crore people in Bangladesh are using mobile phones and five crore people are using the internet.
Though the number of internet users is increasing, the pace of increase is still not enough. This is due to the fact that the cost of using the internet is still beyond many people, particularly in the smaller cities and towns. The expansion of less costly broadband connections similar to that of dish antenna connection for television channels can indeed bring revolution in the use of internet.
Furthermore, the pre-paid and post-paid packages of various mobile operators are still very high. The price of computers has come down significantly over the years, but there is a large section of people who are still unable to afford to buy a desktop computer or a laptop or a smart phone. For quick increase in the number of internet users, the cost of internet use must be made cheaper throughout the country. This can only be done by bringing down prices of various devices through waiving taxes reasonably as applicable.
