Reports published in mass media about Amader Pathshal

Daily Star report

A day of fun and frolic

Annual festival of Amader Pathshala

Shironamhin Performs At The Event. Photo Courtesy: Taslima AkhterA Correspondent

The underprivileged children of Amader Pathshala had a day of fun, music, and entertainment with Shironamhin, Krishnakali, Shamogeet, and Leela at the annual festival of the school on December 25. The vividly decorated school, located in Pallabi, wore a festive look, set off by colourfully attired students. The daylong programme included story telling, painting, singing, drama, and announcement of results of annual examinations.

Members of Amader Pathshala Trust; parents of the students, who are mostly rickshaw pullers or garment workers and the people of surrounding areas attended the programme.

The school children started painting in the morning. To encourage them, a prize was handed out to everyone who came up with a painting. “We teach our students the principle of cooperation as opposed to competition. In other words, if you are a student, you need to do your best rather than worry about doing better than the next person,” said Hassan Rubel, the director of Amader Pathshala. “It's really moving to see how the kids feel about each other. A few days ago, I found that a whole band of children were crying because one boy among them did not do well in the exam,” added Ferdous, a senior teacher of the school.

After refreshment was served in the afternoon, the staging of “Pagla Dashu” by students amused the audience.

Popular band Shironamhin rendered some of its most popular numbers after Arup Rahee's band Leela rendered some Lalon songs. Tanzir Tuhin, the vocal of Shironamhin said, “The success of Amader Pathshala is an example and an encouragement to those who care about a better future for the children.” Tuhin added, “It's amazing to see how the community supported school is running without any sponsorship or funding of big corporations. We hope to continue our support for the school in the future.”

Krishnakali and Shamogeet rendered some songs for the children, including some of their familiar numbers. Then, Kabial Ajit Sarkar and Bimal Sarkar, with their group from Dinajpur entertained the audience with a performance of their Pala Gaan. They called on the children to work for a society that does not discriminate against women.

All the artistes called on the audience to pull out the stops to support the school.

New age report

Amader Pathshala caters for
poor children’s edn
Staff Correspondent

Ibrahim always thought education was not for him as his blind father can hardly maintain his family.
But, Amader Pathshala, a school for underprivileged children, has proved his idea false, — like other children of his age, he is now a student of Class I at the school.
‘I can study as this school provides education free of cost. Here with education, I can get some other facilities like meals,’ said Ibrahim.
One hundred and sixty students of Amader Pathshala have the same story.
‘The school was set up to provide quality education for the poor children,’ said Abul Hassan Rubel, headmaster of the school.
‘Normally, the poor children do not have the access to quality education. Either, they go for the madrassah education or to the NGO schools,’ he said on Saturday, when the school provided the students with the annual report cards.
Students of the school rendered songs and staged plays. Famous band music group, Shironamhin, singer Krishnakali Islam and other musical groups also performed.
With the hope to bring a qualitative change in the education for the poor, Hassan and some other youths started Amader Pathshala in January in 2008 in a rented house in Mirpur with 110 students, mostly from the underprivileged group of society.
The school has now 160 students and eight full time teachers. Students can study from nursery class to the Class VI.
Students are taught according to the National curriculum but, Hassan said, they have their own system to teach. ‘The main difference between our system and the general one is that our students do not play a passive role, rather they are lively and active,’ he said.
From the very beginning, the school is run by individual funding. ‘The fund we collect from individuals is not enough to complete all the programmes,’ Hassan said.
‘Most importantly, we need a permanent campus. Without permanent campus, we are not getting government recognition as a school,’ he added.

Annual Festival Celebrated

With all festive mood Amader Pathshala celebrated its annual day. The students took part on a painting festival, their results were published, and they performed music, dance and play. Other than students performance there were music show by Shironamheen, Samogeet, Leela and Quazi Krisnakoli Islam. Students also took part with the guest artists. Kobi Gan by kobial Ajit Sarkar and kobial Nirmol Sarkar gave a different touch and reminded about the necessity of building a society where women share equal rights to men.
Prize of the annual sports was given by chief guest Anu Muhammad, a renowned economist and activist. Hundreds of friends of Pathshala, Parents of the students, local community enjoyed the whole program.

Primary Terminal Examination

The class five students of Amader Pathshala is going to sit for the primary terminal examination tomorrow for the first time in school's history. As we are not only formal result oriented we don't take it like an acid test but this also has some importance. Especially it can be helpful to grow confidence among students and around. With their limited opportunity at home we still hope our students to be competent with so called rich students and bring a good result. Let us hope and wish the best from them.

Independence Day Observed

Students of Amader Pathshala observed the independence day with color and enthusiasm. It was a hot day with lot of people in the small school premise. Students started the day with drawing pictures, then there was music program and some dance by students and at last a small play was performed.
And before ending the program all the students and guests had some sweets to sweeten the day.

NEW AGE Article on Amader Pathshala

Amader Pathshala treads a tough
road to teach poor children
Sadat Sayem

Sonia Akhter, a Class III student at Amader Pathshala, was colouring a drawing of rural vista in the cultural programme of the school on one Saturday.
The daughter of a garment worker, Sonia often helps her mother in the household chores but she is regular in attending her classes from Uttar Kalshi in the Dhaka city’s Mirpur area.
‘I like to come to school and I enjoy my classes,’ she said.
Like Sonia, Mustak, a Class I student, also enjoys his classes and cultural activities at the school.
His shabby clothes, however, expose his poverty. He lives at a slum near the Mirpur Ceramic factory. Mustak’s father is a blind man, and his mother has no permanent work to earn money for her family.
To make education accessible to the destitute children like Sonia and Mustak, Amader Pathshala started its journey in January 2008 with the slogan ‘quality education for underprivileged children in a humanistic way’.
Located at House 40, Lane 25, Block D of Pallabi at Mirpur, the school has now 160 students.
‘We opened the school to make education accessible to the children who cannot afford to have education at the government and non-government educational institutions because of economic or other reasons,’ said Anu Muhammad, a trustee of the school.
Anu, also a professor of economics at Jahangirnagar University, said, ‘The school always tries to make education interesting to the students when the mainstream educational institutions in the country lack this seriously.’
Amader Pathshala aspires to be a replicable model of institution offering quality education for the poor children.
‘But, the school faces serious shortage of fund and efficient teaching staff,’ Anu said, adding, ‘The hurdles can be overcome if people perform their responsibility to society.’
The school enrols students in Class I to Class VII. The classes are held in two shifts in three rooms of the rented house. The school, which is run with individual financing, charges Tk 10 from each student as monthly fee.
It follows the syllabus being exercised at the public schools but in a different teaching method.
‘We have adopted a teaching method ‘survey-question-read-recite-review’ to develop inquisitive mind of students, and to facilitate active participation of the students to understand the texts,’ said Abul Hasan Rubel, head-teacher of Amader Pathshala.
‘Where in most cases students are inert and submissive to the teachers, our students are lively and active,’ he said.
The students also get basic lessons in art and other cultural activities at the school. ‘Here the teachers do not burden the students with home work and the lessons have been prepared with relevance to their own life,’ he said.
The school provides the students with snacks at the tiffin period with a view to providing them with nutrition.
The school recently has launched computer training programmes for the Class VI and VII students, aiming to make the students capable of earning money to support their families and as well as continue their studies.
‘All our programmes require money to be implemented, and we are facing fund crisis,’ said Rubel. ‘The school does not take funds from the NGOs and the donor agencies as they often try to exercise their influence on the institution which takes funds from them,’ he said.
‘We solely depend on individual financing. If we can manage more individual financing consistently, we will be able to push our educational programmes ahead,’ he added.

Pathshala started a new session and many other new things happening

Amader Pathshala has started its new session by annual festival, to say good bye to the old and welcome the new. The results has been published, students are awarded with art materials and books for their performances and 90% of the students has been promoted to the new class. The classes of the new session has already been started and new textbooks has reached to the hands of students except few books as they are unavailable in the market due to government decision not to sell them.
There is a good news regarding student's malnourishment problem. Pathshala has started its school feeding program for all students to solve the problem at least in part.
The computer classes are in its full swing as all the classes has one desktop now and a teacher is appointed.
Students have participated in an art workshop with German volunteer Kathrina to make an elephant, a tiger and a liox( lion+fox). They have made and coloured it nicely.