One Million Poor Girls and Boys Benefit from Stipends and Tuition Support in Secondary Education
A recent review of the Secondary Education Quality and Access Enhancement Project (SEQAEP) by the World Bank found that project implementation is on track to meet its development objectives. The SEQAEP continued supporting 0.5 million poor girls with tuition, and another 0.46 million poor girls and boys with stipends and tuition.
The Government of Bangladesh has been implementing the project in 122 upazilas outside the Dhaka metropolitan areas since September 2008, with support from the World Bank. It aims to provide stipends and tuition support to the poorer girls and boys; improve academic performance through incentive awards to students, teachers and schools; extend additional support to students in English and Mathematics; improve students’ reading habit; strengthen management and accountability, particularly at the school level; provide water and sanitation facilities in schools; and develop an effective monitoring and evaluation system. The program identifies poor girls and boys through a Proxy-Means Testing (PMT).
The review team commended the implementation progress in view of the completion of the provision of stipends and tuition for first semester of Academic Year 2009, and substantial progress in processing stipend and tuition for the second semester of Academic Year 2009. Moreover, the findings of a baseline survey were disseminated within the Ministry of Education. The Preparatory activities for providing incentive awards beginning from Academic Year 2010, as well as support to students in English and Mathematics, are underway.
This thorough and systematic approach by the Ministry of Education in attracting poorer girls and boys to secondary education in rural upazilas, is based on lessons learnt from the success of an earlier innovative pilot, the Female Secondary School Assistance Project II. Equally innovative is the focus on education quality through performance incentives awards and support to students in English and Mathematics—the two subjects in which the rural students need the support most. The World Bank has been a key partner in supporting secondary education in Bangladesh through providing concessionary financing and technical expertise.
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