Jessore villagers change lifestyle thru' community learning

Disadvantaged women practicing reading exercises while facilitators help them with the text at a literacy centre of Dhaka Ahsania Mission at a Jessore village. PHOTO: STAR

Kohinoor Akhter, Nasima Sultana and Parveen Begum are three of them who transformed their lives and those of their families within a few years by being active members of a community learning centre at Bolepur village in Noapara union of Sadar upazila, Jessore.

Previously, they used to live along with their family members in a pitiable condition at simple thatched huts. They could not afford much of it on meagre income of their share-cropper husbands.

At present their husbands still earn the same meagre amount working the land but the three women earn, on average, 4,000 taka a month by using skills they picked up in a new style of literacy programme innovated by Dhaka Ahsania Mission (DAM), that is making inroads where traditional adult learning programmes have failed.

The women built up a steady pile of savings from their work they developed at the Ganokendra and with the help of loans were able to replace their mud huts.

DAM literacy programme coordinator Shahidul Islam said initially classes started with 70 learners at the Bolepur centre calling it Hashimukh Ganokendra, a people's centre, at a tin-shed room in 2001.

The classes concentrated on literacy and subjects relevant to the learners' lives, he said. Those include how to: reduce sewage pollution of water supplies by using latrines, stave off deforestation by planting useful trees and make fuel-efficient ovens to use less wood and reduce smoke in the house. There is training in skills that could bring in an income such as needlework, gender development education to secure for women a say in the running of the village and leadership training to make community action more effective.

Education has transformed lives of the women which is not only important to them but also important to their children, because they will send them to schools.

There is also a strong emphasis on social mobilisation on issues such as education rights, fighting child trafficking and child marriages, anti-drugs awareness and support work. Other activities include continuous learning programme, micro credit, cow rearing, distribution of books and medicine to poor but meritorious students free of cost, giving legal aid, help admit children of 6 years of age to school and registration of birth, death and marriage. The Ganokendra members are doing the work voluntarily.

Members make regular savings and from the central fund created they give loans to members to help them rear poultry, do tailoring or other small business activities.

During a visit to the Hashimukh Ganokendra, it was found that the walls are covered with awareness posters and charts related to local issues. Many women were seen practising reading exercises while local facilitators supervising the activities. Even some of the women brought children with them.

The real attraction of the Ganokendra is the range of literature it gives its members access to, including different types of books and newspapers.

A crucial factor in the success of the centres is that each one is run by a committee of members and comes together to discuss issues concerning the whole village. The Bolepur centre of Hashimukh Ganokendra is being run by a 5-man advisory council and 11-member executive committee. The committee consists of 100 members.

This is perhaps the unique contribution of the Dhaka Ahsania Mission's Ganokendra work, which is based on a Community Learning Centre concept promoted by UNESCO throughout Asia and the Pacific over the past decade.

On contact, Dhaka Ahsania Mission president Kazi Rafiqul Islam said many organisations are conducting literacy programmes, but on completion of the progra-mme the learners stop exercising their lessons. As a result, they are not benefited by the education imparted to them, he said. Ganokendra was set up to help learners continue 'the never ending process,' he said further. Ultimately, the literacy centres turned into people's centres resulting in their fast growth, he added.

Across Bangladesh more than 50,000 of the poorest people will this year be using Dhaka Ahsania Mission self-learning guides to learn how to read and write. After a five-month course and one month reinforcement learning at one of 800 Ganokendras, they will reach out for the books, skills training and small-scale credit that will help them improve life in their community.