Staff Correspondent:

Despite the corona pandemic, a good number of students belonging to poor and ultra poor families in different isolated villages of the country have got chance to carry their educational activities with the initiatives of a non-government organization (NGO) named Friendship.

The students were given teach through some alternative methods, which has inspired others to adopt the techniques.

Brig Gen (Retd) Ilyas Iftekhar Rasul, Head of the Friendship Education said, “Corona couldn’t stop study of shoal children. Learning was given to around 5,000 disadvantaged students of different remote areas in Gaibandha and Kurigram district through some alternative means. We have maintained good communication between students and their guardians through cell phones. Besides, we have also carried the educational activities through webinar or online, even by running court-yard sessions in different small groups complying with physical distance.”

“The methods have been applied with 43 primary and 16 secondary Friendship schools located in remote shoals in the two districts.

Online training was provided to make the faculties’ jobs easier,”

said Rasul adding that, “Such initiatives have taken due to the corona pandemic with a view to prevent dropout of students from schools. There was no negative impact on the continued education of the students, especially due to backyard education and door-to-door reach.”

Runa Khan, Founder and Executive Director of Friendship said, “A new dimension has been brought into the teaching methods of the organization’s schools. Parents, local community and government administration, in particular, applauded the students for keeping up with their studies for their phone calls, backyard sessions and door-to-door inquiries. I hope that this kind of applause and encouragement will further accelerate Friendship’s work.”

It is to be noted that this new initiative was started in March 2020 during the lockdown. Students are enthusiastically participating in the courtyard sessions, both at their own premises and those of their teachers.

Not only in river basin areas, but also Friendship’s motivational activities are going on across the country to make the students encourage to study.

Secondary education video classes are being uploaded regularly on the Friendship Education YouTube channel, which is free-to-access, and also posted on state-run education portal Kishore Batayan and broadcast on Sangsad TV.