MOE approves 5% admission quota for persons with disabilities in TVET institutions

The Ministry of Education issued a letter on May, 24, 2015, to implement a 5% admission quota for persons with disabilities proposed by the ILO in all Directorate of Technical Education TVET institutions, in line with the Bangladesh Disability Welfare Act (2011) and the National Skills Development Policy (2011).

News | 25 August 2015
The quota was part of a five-point plan for disability inclusion in TVET institutions proposed by the ILO, which was approved in full by the Ministry of Education. The five-point plan, to make TVET institutions accessible to persons with disabilities and ensure the successful implementation of the new admission quota also included;

• Strengthening the demand for skills training by supporting TVET institutions to work closely with Disabled People’s Organisations in mobilising people with disabilities, certifying them for admission and assisting with admission;
• Supporting institutions to become disability friendly, starting by implementing pilot programmes in 3-5 institutions, to become model TVET institutions for inclusion;
• Ensuring allocation of funds in the Directorate of Technical Education (DTE) annual budget for disability mainstreaming;
• Setting up a disability inclusion advisory committee within DTE to guide in policy formulation, disability budgeting and implementation of disability inclusion measures in DTE’s TVET insitutions.

Disability inclusion is being promoted by the government as part of a series of reforms to Bangladesh’s current skills development system. The objective of reform is to make skills in Bangladesh nationally recognised, accessible to all, high quality and directly linked to jobs.
The next step will be a meeting on August 1 with other stakeholders currently implementing skills programmes to seek comment on the implementation of the five-point plan and encourage them to implement similar initiatives.

The ILO is currently working with the Government of Bangladesh to reform the skills development system through two major initiatives; a CAD19.5 million grant from Canada for the Bangladesh Skills for Employment and Productivity (B-SEP) Project, and a Euro 14 million grant from the European Union for the TVET Reform in Bangladesh Project.

See the National Skills Development Policy (English/Bangla) here