Introduction
Bangladesh is a developing country located in south Asia. Since ancient times, Bangladesh culture and economy has been influenced by China and India. At the end of the 20th century, the country developed a national system of education and healthcare based on international principles and standards. Thus, poor economic development of the country and lack of financial support of the government present these systems from rapid growth and development. Bangladesh has long been integrated into the politics and economy of the global world. Though, this cultural and social globalization is accompanied by a thinning of internal solidarity. Today, elite Bangladesh citizens have increasing amounts in common (economically, politically and culturally) with English speakers elsewhere in the world, but experience increasing detachment from the mass of the national society.
Education system in Bangladesh
Education in Bangladesh consists of three stages. The government of Bangladesh controls primary, secondary and high secondary education. the five main categories of education are: (1) General Education System, (2) Madrasah Education System, (3) Technical – Vocational Education System, (4) Professional Education System, (5) Other Education Systems. In Bangladesh, primary education and health care are free. An amazing official statistic informs us that %100 (sic) of all children in the appropriate age band are educated in primary schools. The UN Human Development Index suggests that only % 55 of children go to school during the first three years. The census gathers data on literacy; in 1991 the literacy rate was %41.1, male literacy %53 and female % 35. Since the acceptance of the standard of liberalization, there has been an support of welfare and educational development provision via non-governmental organizations (Literacy in Bangladesh 2009). The best of these can be excellent, but they can be erratic in their education provision and far too many are either amateurish or corrupt. NGOs receive the bulk of their funding from the Government of Bangladesh, not (as many critics assume) from charities. Directly or indirectly, the state of Bangladesh continues to be the major provider in the education field and it is to be hoped that it will hold this role for a very long time, with the proviso that there be sufficient controlling of the actions of educators (Education in Bangladesh 2009).
A special type of colleges introduced by the government is cadet colleges. These institutions can be compared to public schools in Britain. Bangladesh spends a small proportion of its education budget on primary schools and a remarkably large amount on higher education including graduate and post-graduate programs. The poor provision of free schooling implies that a disproportionate number of unreserved places at the highly subsidized universities are won by those people who have received a private schooling – a good issue for those citizens who can afford it to invest in the school days of their children, but also a good issues for them not to be concerned to raise standards in public schools. it is important to note that the group of professionals and bureaucrats reproduces itself through its appropriation of higher education of a high standard. High education is crucial for public employees as it determines a degree of career development and pay structure (Education 2009).
In Bangladesh, education has long been an important issue of controversy as it was provided in the English language only. The Board of education introduced new rules and obliged teachers to educate children on the native language. Thus, many upper-class families want to educate their children expensively in the most exclusive British language schools and universities. This expenditure results in professions which are internationally recognized and open up employment opportunities on a international scale; but such professions and diplomas also put a candidate in a very strong position when challenging for senior positions in national and international corporations in Bangladesh. in the country, private schooling in English is seen an essential necessity of the affluent middle classes and above and, as a consequence, school fees have a previous claim on household income over consumer goods. Although the mass media often reports on the material over-indulgence of middle-class citizens, the reality is that the big expenditure on children of both genders is in terms of their education, rather than their leisure issues or possessions (Heitzman and Worden 2002).
In spite of these changes, the government education has very low standards of provision and high incidence of teacher absenteeism. The state lacks 15,5% of primary teachers. The school curriculum is dull and uninspiring and levels of achievement of many children are low. As a consequence, middle-class cities do everything they can to educate their children in the many small private, profit-making, English-medium schools, often not of high standard of education and with underqualified teachers (Heitzman and Worden 2002).
In Bangladesh, a good public-school in a major city has high fees a year. The education of children of the upper classes is persistently directed towards high personal achievement; even very young children are given corrective amounts of homework and nervous parents employ tutors after hours to keep them up to scratch in their weaker subjects. Also, there are instruction in various activities such as music and drawing. The boys and girls are taught a great deal but education all too often takes the form of rote learning and pouring new knowledge and skills into them, rather than encouraging their own abilities. Many of the children are made competitive and taught to win because their parents know that places in the super elite are scarce (Education 2009). At the beginning of the 21st century, there is an educated class of people in Bangladesh often with qualifications much higher than one would expect for their standard of living and type of employment. Many citizens of Bangladesh have university degrees and virtually all males have completed 12 years of schooling. This category of society is literate, informed and politically active. It performs a considerable demand for TV news and periodicals. For all this, it is not always intellectual in its tastes.
Healthcare system in Bangladesh
Health care in Bangladesh consists of private and public sectors. Following WHO, “Bangladesh has made significant progress in recent times in many of its social development indicators particularly in health” (Bangladesh Healthcare WHO 2009). Thus, views are sharply divided as to whether increased integration into the global economy causes a healthcare revolution and the end of mass poverty. Advocates of the free market and deregulation claim that healthcare will take time to work, others are skeptical as to whether it works at all. Bangladesh remains the World Bank’s biggest borrower. Ill health in the family can cause serious suffering to people in the lower middle classes as they try to afford private healthcare. This becomes particularly acute if hospital treatment is required. Many plan for this by taking out health insurance policies (Bangladesh Healthcare 2009). There are no significant welfare payments for people who become chronically sick and cannot work; people try to save against this and hope they can rely on family reciprocal care. Members of the upper middle class have good healthcare insurance cover which allows them to visit the best private clinics and hospitals equipped to international standards (the very rich go abroad for major surgery). “The public sector is largely used for in-patient and preventive care while the private sector is used mainly for outpatient curative care. Primary Health Care (PHC) has been chosen by the Government of Bangladesh as the strategy to achieve the goals of “Health for all” which is now being implemented as Revitalized Primary Health Care” (Bangladesh Healthcare WHO 2009).
A significant section of Bangladesh healthcare is dedicated to socialist principles and to social causes. There is a thriving healthcare movement; there are anti-corruption campaigns; there is support for healthcare, welfare and education programs for poor people in urban and rural areas; there is a considerable concern for the environment and a growing anti-nuclear movement; there is agitation on human rights issues and opposition to communalist tendencies. Many of the citizens of the slums are ‘ecological refugees’, those people forced from the land by ‘development’ or environmental degradation. It was estimated that there are 3 million people in Bangladesh who have been displaced from their homes by ‘development’ projects. Given that there is a shortage of cultivable land a significant but unknown proportion of these come as destitute to the urban centers with few relevant skills and only their labor to sell, refugees in their own country. Urban poverty is intimately connected with poor health provision and inadequate services. As a consequence, so long as there is greater economic growth in the towns than in the villages, economic growth will not lead to increased wages for urban workers. Urban poverty declines only when there is a growth in regulated labor intensive industries but, the tendency has been towards investment in high productivity, capital intensive industry with ancillary outsourcing of labor concentrated production in the informal sector, where wages are driven down by the excess of available unskilled and semi-skilled labor (Bangladesh Healthcare 2009).
In spite of great economic and social changes, the private system of healthcare is underdeveloped in Bangladesh. Thus, like other developing countries, Bangladesh introduces employment pensions and private medical insurance, preferential treatment in waiting lists for telephones and gas connections, reservation of seats on trains and in cinemas, and the sympathetic treatment of old people in public healthcare. “In the private sector, there are traditional healers (Kabiraj, totka, and faith healers like pir / fakirs), homeopathic practitioners, village doctors (rural medical practitioners RMPs/ Palli Chikitsoks-PCs), community health workers (CHWs) and finally, retail drugstores that sell allopathic medicine on demand” (Bangladesh Healthcare WHO 2009). That is to say, it is an entirely cosmetic exercise. In a country where good medical care is exorbitantly expensive, where there are few support agencies and where there is no right to a state pension, elderly people can hardly be expected to greet an increasing individualization and market orientation with enthusiasm. They need to be able to claim their rights as citizens; however, old people, particularly frail old people, are less able than younger women to organize themselves in resistance (Bangladesh Healthcare 2009).
Conclusion
In sum, the education and healthcare system in Bangladesh is underdeveloped and suffers from lack of financial support and qualified professionals. Poor education and inadequate healthcare lead to social problems and health problems experienced by the majority of society. Today, the new social classes consist of citizens who in the past would almost certainly have not made their careers. Minor changes in education and healthcare open up new opportunities for the population to enter trade and business and participate in economic relations and service provision.
Works Cited
Bangladesh Healthcare. WHO. 2009. Web.
Bangladesh Healthcare. 2009. Web.
Education in Bangladesh. People republic of Bangladesh. 2009. Web.
Education. Bangladesh education and resource Center. 2009. Web.
Literacy in Bangladesh. 2009. Web.
James Heitzman and Robert Worden, editors. Bangladesh: A Country Study. Washington: GPO for the Library of Congress, 2002.