Letters
Postponement of Uni-track Education System
We hail the government's decision to postpone the introduction of a uni-track secondary education system in place of the existing old multi-stream curricula for one year. The new system had proposed a substantial change; many of our experts and people concerned have stated that it would further dwindle the country's standard of education. According to news-reports, the authorities are not prepared enough in terms of training teachers and making the students and their parents aware of the proposed system. Hence, an attempt to initiate the proposed system at this stage would result in complete devastation in the academic lives of millions of our young minds.
The country is not prepared for any further debacle in decision-making regarding key issues of national interest like this and we strongly feel that a careful analysis has to be made on the issue first before any further step is taken. This is entirely an apolitical issue and so there should not be any obstruction in involving all stakeholders with the decision-making process in this matter. We seriously need a practical and visionary national education policy and guidelines on the basis of the opinions of everybody concerned to prepare our student.
All that we look forward to now is a sincere government effort for a careful consultative process by experts, academies, school authorities, teaching community and the civil society at large before such a paradigm shift in terms of curricula takes place.
Takad Ahmed Chowdhury
Assistant Professor of English
The University of Asia Pacific (UAP)
Happy New Year
Another year swept by and we greeted each other with a "Happy New Year" and fake broad smiles pasted on our faces. It's not that easy to be happy when the situation of the country is so insecure and doubtful. Nevertheless, let us try to look at the bright side of everything that happened in the past year.
We accomplished a highly secured (not that successful though) SAARC summit spending hundreds of dollars on the event.
The government finally woke up to the existence of religious militants in the country, though it took several blasts.
RAB and other law enforcing authorities halted their so-called crossfire, after, of course getting rid of the necessary issues.
The most criticised one-way system of education at high school level has been cancelled, though more than a million has already been spent on it.
The Bangladesh football team has shown an overwhelming success reaching the semi finals of the SAARC football tournament, though it lost badly in the final.
Istiaque Uddin Rifat
Dept. of EEE, 3rd year, RUET
On 'Defining Liberty'
The article by Hana Shams Ahmed of the last issue coincidentally expressed the same thoughts that I wanted to say for a long time. So called 'feminists' are screaming for equal rights when they are always seeking for extra facilities in every sphere of life. This is pure hypocrisy, which is absolutely unbearable. The simple truth is that the women in our country are still very backward as compared to the men, which is why they require these extra facilities to go on in life. Moreover, a woman has to face a lot of hardships to survive when her male counterpart has no idea whatsoever of the problems faced by women.
The funny thing is that men seem to think that they rescue women by providing them all the extra facilities, which would make life easier for them. They play the part of God himself, thus overlooking women and their actual purpose in life. They ruthlessly dominate over a woman and make her decisions for her.
Germaine Greer's opinion about hijab is praiseworthy when many feminists are thinking of hijab as oppression for women. I wear hijab, but do not feel oppressed one bit. I think life is a difficult struggle for a woman. At every point in life, women have to go through severe scrutiny and a judgemental attitude from men and women alike. It's clear that woman and men need each other to survive in life. However, even though women are taught to stand as a pillar of support for their husbands, the same cannot be said regarding men supporting their wives.
Misty
DU
Healthy information
As an avid reader of the magazine, I like the regulars that are published in the magazine like the Dhaka Diary, Sci Tech, the various columns and the book reviews. The Health page is worth a special mention since this particular regular contains a lot of useful information for the general public and readers alike.
The health published last week was very informative indeed, coinciding with the holiday season. With Christmas, New Year's and the Eid-ul-Azha holidays stacked all together, there was indeed a lot of eating this season, either responding to pangs of hunger or eating at relatives' as an obligation.
What many in our country do not understand is that proper diet along with drinking plenty of fresh and clean water every day can eliminate half of the diseases and the distressful situations faced by many, both physical and mental. Rather than eating out at expensive eateries or having oily food to keep our taste buds alive, its always better to eat what every season has to offer, like fresh fruits and vegetables for snacks and as late night move-watching-companions.
In a country where more than half the population toil under the poverty line, eating cheap but fresh and healthy is actually the best way to have a healthy nation.
Mohammed Selimullah
Indira Road
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