Achievement of Primary Competencies : A Comparison between BPS and EIC Schools

Using the competency-based test instrument developed for Education Watch 2000 this study made a comparison of learning achievement of the students of two BRAC programmes. These are BRAC Primary Schools (BPS) and Education for Indigenous Children (EIC) programme. Number of students under the test was 1,616; 810 for BPS and 806 for EIC. The students were brought under test at the end of their primary cycle. This is the first batch of graduates under EIC programme and eighth batch under BPS. The study clearly showed a sharp difference in the performance of the students of BPS and EIC, where the former group of students did significantly better than that of the later group. Gender difference was also higher in EIC than BPS. As the first batch of EIC programme the students did well compared to the performance of the first batch of BPS eight years back. Having women teachers in the community, well educated persons as teachers and providing two-teachers in one school are still some of the challenges that EIC programme is facing. The performance of the students under EIC programme can be improved overcoming the challenges. A number of competencies were identified where additional input is required