There is a strange comfort in fighting yesterday’s battles. They are familiar, already mapped, and often politically rewarding.
One can speak with authority, invoke past victories, and promise the same remedies as if time itself had remained obediently still.
Listening to our esteemed education minister, one gets the uneasy sense that Bangladesh’s education crisis is still being narrated through the lens of 2001 to 2006, when the most visible enemy was copying in examination halls.
But the crisis we inhabit today is quieter, deeper, and far more systemic. It does not sit in the last bench of an exam room with a folded piece of paper. It is embedded in the structure itself.
Two decades ago, the crackdown on open cheating was necessary. It restored a degree of procedural integrity to public examinations.
Yet, as John Dewey once argued, education is not merely about discipline or order, but about meaningful learning experiences that prepare individuals for life.
When a system becomes obsessed with policing outcomes rather than cultivating learning, it risks producing compliance instead of competence.
Today, the evidence of that failure is difficult to ignore. The paradox of the “GPA-5 generation” has become almost a cliché in Bangladesh.
Students with the highest possible grades enter universities unable to write a coherent paragraph in English or solve basic mathematical problems expected at the secondary level.
This is not a moral failure of students. It is a structural failure of the system that certifies them.
The problem is no longer copying inside exam halls. In many cases, the exam has already been compromised long before students take their seats.
Question leaks, facilitated by networks that extend from printing presses to digital platforms, have transformed the nature of cheating. It is no longer an act of desperation by individual students but an organized distortion of merit.
Installing CCTV cameras or distributing tablets to teachers may create the illusion of modernization, but these are cosmetic interventions in a system whose deeper logic is misaligned.
If one looks beyond Bangladesh, the contrast becomes sharper.
Countries like Finland have long abandoned high-stakes, exam-centric models in favour of trust-based, teacher-driven systems. Finnish students do not face the same relentless testing culture, yet they consistently perform at the top in global assessments such as those conducted by OECD.
The secret is neither surveillance nor punishment, but investment in teachers, curriculum relevance, and equity.
Similarly, Singapore, often cited for its rigorous standards, has continuously reformed its curriculum to emphasise critical thinking, creativity, and adaptability. As Lee Kuan Yew famously understood, a nation’s most valuable resource is its human capital.
But human capital cannot be engineered through rote learning and exam scores alone. It requires a system that rewards curiosity and competence rather than memorization.
Bangladesh, by contrast, seems trapped in a peculiar contradiction. On paper, educational expansion has been remarkable. Enrolment rates have increased, gender parity has improved, and access to schooling has widened.
Yet, beneath these achievements lies a troubling erosion of quality. The Bengali medium curriculum, which serves the overwhelming majority of students, has failed to keep pace with global standards. It remains outdated, often disconnected from contemporary knowledge systems and labour market demands.
This growing gap has created a two-tiered system. On one side, a small but influential segment pursues English medium education, often aligned with international curricula.
On the other, the vast majority navigate a Bengali medium system that struggles to provide even foundational skills. The result is not just inequality of opportunity, but inequality of capability.
The sociologist Pierre Bourdieu would describe this as a reproduction of social capital, where educational systems reinforce existing hierarchies instead of dismantling them.
In Bangladesh, education increasingly reflects one’s socioeconomic position rather than altering it. The promise of mobility through merit is slowly giving way to a quiet resignation.
At the heart of this crisis lies the most neglected component of any education system: The teacher. No reform, however well-designed, can succeed without competent and motivated educators.
Yet, teaching in Bangladesh has gradually lost both prestige and financial viability. Salaries remain inadequate, professional development opportunities are limited, and social respect has diminished.
As a result, many talented individuals simply avoid the profession. Those who do enter often do so as a last resort rather than a conscious calling.
This is not an indictment of individual teachers, many of whom work under extraordinarily difficult conditions. It is a reflection of a system that has failed to prioritise them.
Contrast this with South Korea, where teachers are among the most respected professionals in society. Recruitment is highly competitive, training is rigorous, and continuous development is institutionalized.
The outcome is predictable. A system staffed by capable educators is far more resilient than one that relies on administrative control.
The condition of government schools and colleges further illustrates the depth of the problem. Reports of irregular classes, absentee teachers, and weak monitoring mechanisms are no longer isolated incidents. They point to a governance failure that cannot be addressed through technological fixes alone.
Once, government institutions were the backbone of quality education, attracting the best students and teachers. Today, their declining standards have eroded public confidence.
This shift has broader implications. When public education weakens, private alternatives expand, often without adequate regulation.
The result is a fragmented landscape where quality varies widely and access is determined by affordability. Education, instead of being a public good, becomes a private commodity.
The economist Amartya Sen has repeatedly emphasized that education is central to development not just as a tool for economic growth, but as a means of expanding human freedom. A system that produces graduates without skills, degrees without knowledge, and aspirations without pathways, ultimately constrains that freedom.
What is perhaps most concerning is the persistence of outdated narratives in policy discourse. When policy-makers continue to frame the crisis as one of cheating in examination halls, they risk misdiagnosing the problem entirely.
It is akin to treating a chronic illness with temporary painkillers. The symptoms may subside, but the disease continues to spread.
The current crisis is multi-dimensional. It involves curriculum stagnation, teacher shortages, governance failures, and technological disruptions. It requires a holistic response that goes beyond enforcement to address the structural foundations of learning.
Reform, therefore, must begin with an honest recognition of reality.
The curriculum needs urgent modernization, aligned with global standards while remaining contextually relevant. Teacher recruitment, training, and compensation must be prioritized to restore both quality and dignity to the profession.
Assessment systems need to shift from rote-based evaluation to competency-based learning. And governance mechanisms must ensure accountability without stifling innovation.
Equally important is a cultural shift. Education cannot be reduced to grades and certificates. It must be understood as a process of intellectual and personal development.
This requires not just policy changes, but a transformation in societal attitudes towards learning.
Bangladesh stands at a critical juncture. Its demographic dividend offers immense potential, but only if it is supported by a robust education system.
Otherwise, it risks becoming a demographic burden, where a large population is inadequately prepared for the demands of a rapidly changing world.
The temptation to revisit past successes is understandable. But nostalgia is not a strategy.
The challenges of today demand new thinking, new priorities, and above all, the courage to confront uncomfortable truths. Continuing to fight the battles of 2001 will not solve the problems of 2026.
Education, after all, is not static. It evolves with society, technology, and the aspirations of people. A system that fails to evolve inevitably falls behind. And when education falls behind, the consequences are not confined to classrooms. They shape the future of the nation itself.
HM Nazmul Alam is an Academic, Journalist, and Political Analyst based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Currently he teaches at IUBAT.
