GROWTH OF INFORMAL EDUCATION SECTOR IN BANGLADESH: A CASE STUDY ON BARISHAL CITY CORPORATION AREA

The study aimed to identify the factors which are associated with the growth of the informal education sector in Bangladesh. The Barishal city, a southern rising city of Bangladesh was selected as a study area. An explorative research design was chosen for the study. A total of 100 respondents (students) participated in the study and two FGDs (Parents & Teacher) taken for both quantitative and qualitative data collection. Empirical data refers to that in the study area informal educational institutions are rising and functioning as a shadow education system. Most of the students are dependent on informal education institutions because they believe that formal institutions are not capable to provide satisfactory services. The major factors which are responsible for fall of the formal education sector are lack of attention of the authority, big student size in the classroom, a small number of teachers at the formal institution, unjustified syllabus, teachers' intention to not provide quality education in the classroom due to low salary, etc. Moreover, psychologically students and parents are dependent on the informal education system to get desirable success in the public examination where the teachers are interested to earn extra money by providing extra time and care in the informal educational system.