Bangladesh has nearly 0.1m privately-owned edn instts

Bangladesh has nearly 0.1 million private-sector educational institutions including 6,590 coaching centres across the country, according to a government survey.

A total of 1.484 million people are employed including 1.145 million teachers in the institutions, also reveals the study conducted by Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS).

Besides, 29.32 million students study in the privately-owned educational institutions where the share of female students is higher than their male counterparts, also shows the survey.

Of the total students, 52.34 per cent are female while the rest 47.66 per cent are male.

The participation of females in the teaching job is also satisfactory as the BBS has found 37.52 per cent women are involved in the teaching profession at the private-sector institutions.

According to the BBS, the privately-owned institutions are mostly run by the board of directors or by the managing committee (50.27 per cent) while 28.24 per cent of them are run by individual owners.

Besides, a total of 13.02 per cent private educational institutions are run by partnership while 5.96 per cent are by trustee board or by foundation, the BBS statistics shows.

Analysts say the coaching centres are one of the obstacles for the students to flourish their merits as most of those are run on commercial basis and depended on guide books and notes.

And in most of the cases, since the coaching centres are set up on the commercial ground, quality of education at schools, collages, madrasas and other types of institutions are compromised, they said.

The past governments took steps to wipe out the coaching centers, but failed.

A BBS official said although the private sector educational institutions are playing vital role in educational development and human resources development in the country, the huge number of coaching centers, run on commercial basis, are affecting the quality education.

Meanwhile, the BBS survey has showed that the privately-owned coaching centers have created some employment over the years.

In the calendar year 2023, the coaching centres had created a total of 61,300 teaching jobs in their institutions, the survey showed.

Bishnu Kumar Adhikary, assistant professor, Institute of Education and Research (IER) at the University of Rajshahi, told the FE that the coaching center usually focuses on making products rather than education expansion and human resources development.

"The coaching centres do not follow any government system or guideline. So the students are deprived from the real education," he said.

The guardian is also bringing their child to the coaching centre which is also a big problem in Bangladesh, Assistant Professor Bishnu said.