On the 7th of January, 2020, the Centre for Peace and Justice (CPJ), Brac University arranged a day-long forum on the role of faith factors in the education system in Bangladesh titled ‘Forum on Faith and Education in Bangladesh: Pathways to Pluralism’ at Hotel Amari, Dhaka. CPJ is in collaboration with the World Faiths Development Dialogue (WFDD) at the Berkeley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs at Georgetown University, where they explore important issues at the intersection of faith, development and social cohesion.
The team in Bangladesh is led by Associate Prof. Samia Huq, PhD, research fellow at CPJ and Interim Dean of Humanities and Social Sciences, Brac University along with Ms. Aisha Rob and Mr. Riedwan Habibur Rahman. The forum is the result of the research they started in 2019 focusing on faith, education and diversity which brought together regional and global experts with long standing experience in education policy and development. Chaired by Prof. Katherine Marshall, Executive Director, World Faiths Development Dialogue (WFDD), Professor of Development, Conflict and Religion, Georgetown University USA, and Senior Fellow at the Berkeley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs, this event also had Dr. Stephen Heyneman, Professor Emeritus of International Education Policy, Vanderbilt University; Dr. Jamhari Makruf, Lecturer and Deputy Rector of Universitas Islam Negeri Syarif Hidayatullah, Indonesia and Dr. Sudipta Roy, Faculty Fellow in Education, Colby College, USA as key speakers who discussed important and interconnected issues of education and diversity, not just in Bangladesh but also globally.
Manzoor Hasan, OBE, Executive Director of CPJ, Brac University gave the Welcome Speech and the Forum was inaugurated by Prof. Katherine Marshall. Dr. Samia Huq provided the audience with the project overview followed by a brief summary. The main attraction of the forum was the presentation by Dr. Sudipta Roy, which brought the research findings from Bangladesh to the fore through the lens of the NCTB books in Bangladesh. All the speakers tried to explore the role of faith-inspired organizations in education and the challenges and possibilities towards pluralism through education. Dr. Stephen Heyneman mentioned that religion is a part and parcel of life. Children of the current generation should realize that they do have a life outside Facebook. He further stated that no society can prosper without social cohesion and public education provides this social cohesion, which is much underestimated in Bangladesh but fortunately, the people are now realizing it gradually. The forum ended with reflections from Islamic Foundation, Caritas, ISKCON and Rama Krishna Mission presented and shared their findings and knowledge from the ground.