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The main aim of this paper is to assess the level of knowledge, attitude and practice of university teachers regarding plagiarism in Bangladesh. An online questionnaire consisted of 20 knowledge questions, 23 attitude items, and 18 practice questions was created using Google Forms. The link to the questionnaire was sent via email to university teachers. The total correct answers for knowledge and practice questions, and the total attitude score were converted to percentile scores and categorized accordingly as poor (< mean -- 1 SD), average (mean ± 1 SD), and good (> mean + 1 SD). Bivariate analyses were conducted to compare the total knowledge, attitude and practice scores based on demographic and academic variables. Multiple linear regressions were used to identify the association between knowledge, attitude and practice scores, and other covariates. The findings revealed an average level of knowledge, attitude and practice regarding plagiarism among the majority of university teachers. The knowledge, attitude and practice scores were significantly higher for teachers who attended academic writing workshops compared to those who did not attend such events. Demographic and academic variables did not impact knowledge and attitude scores. However, the number of papers published in the last two years and their indexing in Web of Science (WoS) or Scopus significantly impacted attitude and knowledge scores. The multiple regression analyses showed that the practice score was significantly associated with age, highest education, and knowledge.

This paper presents a comprehensive review of existing literature concerning the domains of accreditation and quality assurance in various sectors. Accreditation and quality assurance play vital roles in ensuring the credibility, transparency, and effectiveness of educational institutions, healthcare facilities, industries, and other domains. This paper synthesizes the findings of numerous studies, focusing on the conceptual frameworks, methodologies, and outcomes associated with accreditation and quality assurance processes. The review encompasses a wide range of perspectives, including historical context, best practices, challenges, and advancements in accreditation and quality assurance. Through a systematic analysis of these scholarly works, this paper aims to provide a deeper understanding of the evolving landscape of accreditation and quality assurance across diverse sectors and shed light on potential future research directions.

Distance education has emerged out of social compulsion, the dynamics of change and new cultures. It was the failure of traditional systems to be able to meet the demand in countries, where the resources available for tertiary education are limited, which basically gave birth to the new trend of education known as open and distance education. This new and innovative system of education has received a high level of acceptance in different countries as it offers flexible educational opportunities for continuing education to a large segment of their population. The increasing number of older adult learners with varying lifestyles in the population, increasing competitiveness of getting places in tertiary institutions, higher cost of education and a shortage of teachers are the main factors for increasing the popularity of distance education (Duncan, "et al.," 2003). Bangladesh has also taken the opportunity to provide a uniform and mass oriented universal system of education through open and distance education establishing Bangladesh Open University (BOU) in 1992. Objectives of the Study: The main objectives of this study are: (1) to assess the overall status of BOU in comparison with the open universities of two neighboring South Asian countries considering the following aspects: (a) Administrative structural functions; (b) Courses and instructional strategies; (c) Learning opportunities, and (d) Library, laboratory and counselling facilities; (2) to explore the potential of improvement for BOU to enable it to meet the challenges of the country's educational needs in the next millennium. (Contains 1 figure and 8 tables.)

The paper examines the effectiveness of materials designed and distributed among course instructors to teach an intermediate writing course in an online platform during the pandemic. The study is examined in the context of a private university in Bangladesh, where the students enrolled are bi-lingual learners. The paper reviews literature in fields of technology-enhanced language learning (TELL), activity theory and scaffolding to understand the extent to which the teaching materials are effective. In addition, by analysing semi-structured interview responses from course instructors, the paper highlights numerous strengths, weaknesses and suggestions regarding the materials disbursed among the faculty members. The research findings suggest that the given materials were useful and helped to promote understanding of course content, but improvements can be made to assist student learning. Increased emphasis on learner autonomy can facilitate the learning process for students and motivate them to become independent learners. Based on the findings, the writer includes suggestions that might be beneficial for institutions beyond borders.

By examining Bangladesh's educational policies and practices, this paper investigates the transition from technical vocational education and training (TVET) to HE (HE). This study specifically focuses on two areas: how TVET graduates' access to HE looks like in Bangladesh and what role HE institutions can play in boosting TVET graduates' engagement in HE in Bangladesh by taking a cue from the Australian TVET system. Based on Marginson's 'high participation systems' theory, it focuses on how TVET courses can lead to HE and how universities can facilitate TVET diploma holders' access to bachelor's degrees in their fields of study in Bangladesh. The qualitative content analysis of policy documents served as the foundation for this paper. This paper aims to advance our understanding of how structural obstacles (elitism) affect pathways from TVET to HE and how international 'best practices' can be localized in the Bangladeshi context.

Involving the global issues as listed in Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in education is necessarily done in the education process, especially in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learning. Exposure to global issues is known to improve students' understanding, awareness, and ability to solve urgent issues faced by global society. This paper aims to find out the trend of research on the coverage of SDGs in students' learning process. This systematic literature analysis was done by applying Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) Method. A total of 25 studies were recognized through a systematic search by using Sustainability, SDGs, and EFL as keywords. The result shows that the trend of associating SDGs with EFL settings was done mostly in Indonesia. In the recent year 2022, it reached the highest number of studies in the particular matter with 7 total of research. It was also found that the study involving SDGs on EFL learning was mostly done in the tertiary setting, compared with K-12, junior high school, secondary, high school, and other educational institutions. It was also discovered that the specific area of study enhances EFL students' learning achievement, environmental awareness, global citizen values, as well as students' levels of self-norms, beliefs, and self-value.

In the face of sudden migration to online teaching due to Covid-19 pandemic, education is going under trying times globally, especially in the low resource contexts of the Global South. Little is, however, known about how this forced migration to and coping with emergency remote teaching (ERT) are happening in the low resource context of developing Bangladesh, particularly in the Higher Education (HE). This paper, therefore, aims to understand how virtual classrooms look like in the Higher Education context in Bangladesh through TESOL teachers' narratives from initial virtual classrooms imparting ERT. Employing narrative inquiry, four teachers from four different public and private universities in Bangladesh share their experiences of doing, undergoing and reflecting as they try to adopt, adapt and strive in imparting ERT and carrying out education in HE. Insights from these initial teacher narratives may inform higher education pedagogies, teacher development in distance education environments in Bangladesh and similar contexts in the Global South. As the paper addresses HE teachers' initial orientation to ERT without exclusively dealing with TESOL education, it has multidisciplinary approach to migration to and coping with ERT in HE in general.

The study aims to understand the foremost challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study adopts the PRISMA approach to screening the selection of journal articles and review papers according to the research aims and the inclusion criteria. The journal articles and review papers were extracted and stored in Microsoft Excel and Google Scholar, Academic. Microsoft, Semantic Scholar, Elsevier, and Emerald Insight databases searched relevant documents using formulated keywords. A statistical technique was applied using the M.S. Excel analysis tool (PivotTable and an independent t-Test) to analyze data and determine the differences between teachers and students. The review revealed the evidence that the majority of the studies were primarily focused on the individual developing countries and results from other developing countries were not considered. In addition, the foremost challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic were inadequate skills and training, inadequate Internet/Infrastructure, lack of supporting resources and lack of online student engagement and feedback. Finally, the independent t-test reveals there is no statistically significant difference in challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Both teachers and students encounter similar challenges. The systematic review raised concerns that higher learning needs to effectively implement long term strategies and support teachers and students in getting into online teaching and learning.

This paper seeks to explore the impact of video lectures on the students of the Department of English of a Bangladeshi private university during the world pandemic, COVID-19. Using various online resources, especially YouTube videos, website links, e-texts, and journal articles, to make a classroom vibrant, interesting, engaging, and entertaining and to disseminate the best possible knowledge among students was the common trend in the classrooms of the English Department of Daffodil International University (DIU) before the pandemic. However, using teacher-developed materials in the classroom was not a regular phenomenon in the culture of higher education in Bangladesh, particularly in the Department of English at DIU. This paper will explore what kind of positive motivation this shift brought to get the students more engaged in the classroom during the worldwide crisis. It will also discuss whether the teacher-made video lectures helped students understand the topic(s) better. This study intends to address these issues besides inspecting the general pros and cons of using such materials in a tertiary classroom. The data were collected through close-ended and open-ended questionnaires from the selected students and analyzed using qualitative and quantitative research methods. The researchers hypothesized that teacher-made video lectures were more effective given that students' and instructors' similar stress and intonation, pronunciation, and cultural experiences which helped learners comprehend the lesson topics in comparison with materials prepared commercially. This paper also highlights the students' expectations and satisfaction, particularly related to the video lectures made by teachers compared to those taken from popular online resources.

Vocabulary knowledge is very crucial for learners who want to be competent in a language. Vocabulary knowledge means having the knowledge of or command over words of a language and their usages in real-life contexts. Vocabulary knowledge can be gained incidentally and intentionally. The paper compares the effectiveness of the reading-only condition and reading-while-listening condition in incidental vocabulary acquisition. It seeks to find out whether students acquire more vocabulary knowledge by reading a text only or reading the text while listening to it. It also disseminates the effect of word exposure frequency. By applying four vocabulary tests, it proves that learners can gain vocabulary knowledge in both the conditions; but the reading-while-listening condition can result in more gain of vocabulary knowledge. The paper also shows that the more the number of encounters with words in context, the more the vocabulary gains. Studies with students from different levels of education and gender based studies can be conducted. This is a pioneering study on this topic in Bangladesh, so the paper will pave a way for the researchers who want to work on the same topic.

The major analytical research question addressed in this paper is: What are Thailand's strengths and weaknesses as an international education hub for students from the Asian region? The key descriptive research question is: What is the nature of the educational experience of Asian students in Thailand? The two major research methodologies of the study are mixed research methods and comparative case studies, with the use of in-depth interviews of influential experts, surveys, and an autoethnography. In terms of major findings, there has been a dramatic growth of Asian students at Thai universities during the past two decades. Thailand's major advantages relate to low costs, location, quality campus facilities, and a welcoming attitude toward outsiders, while major disadvantages are the quality of many of Thailand's international programs often related to low English language capabilities. The paper concludes by presenting a creative new architecture for thinking about Asian study abroad in Thailand.

The paper evaluates the ELT textbook "English for Today" (Classes Nine--Ten) which is used as a dominant instructional material in secondary level schools and madrasahs in Bangladesh. The National Curriculum and Textbook Board (NCTB) of Bangladesh published the revised edition of the textbook series "English for Today" in the academic year 2013 incorporating the guidelines proposed in National Education Policy (NEP, 2010) and National Curriculum (NC, 2012). Ever since the introduction of the ELT textbook series, systematic evaluations to examine their pedagogical usefulness and constraints have been found inadequate. The purpose of the study is, therefore, to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the textbook which will help the teachers do maximum application of its strengths in the classroom, and make sensible decisions about the weaknesses. This study followed the 'whilst-use' evaluation type, and adopted mainly the checklist method. The checklist was designed drawing on suitable criteria from the popular checklist developed by McDonough, Shaw and Masuhara (2013). In addition, a short semi-structured interview was conducted with 10 secondary English teachers in order to explore how the teachers would perceive and evaluate the textbook. Though the evaluation identified the textbook's rewarding features, it also revealed a number of limitations which require sincere attention of the curriculum and materials developers. The study implies that the textbook requires both internal and external improvements in order to maximize the learning outcomes and meet the curriculum objectives. The paper also makes recommendations for the curriculum experts and textbook writers for consideration during future editions of the textbook.

The Sylheti Bangla, a variety of Bangla language is primarily spoken in the Sylhet District of Bangladesh, Barak Valley of Assam, Tripura, especially in North Tripura. The systematic perusal on English spoken by Sylheti Bangla speakers demonstrates that it carries a huge difference with English (RP) specially in respect to pronunciation, syllable structure, stress, intonation. The disparities between Sylheti English and English (RP) are because of a number of divergent variances between Sylheti Bangla and English which often makes the acquisition of English an arduous job for the Sylheti speakers. The errors committed by Sylheti speakers during their speaking in English can be attributed to the interference of the rule of mother tongue in learning the second language. This interference can be of phonological, morphological and sentence structure. However, the domain of this paper is exclusive to phonological interference of L1 on L2 through the contrastive analysis of the phonological aspects of Sylheti Bangla and English (RP). This paper intends to improve the status of English teaching-learning process compared to contemporary practices. Thus, it aspires to contribute to the theory of second language acquisition with a particular focus on learning English by the Sylheti speakers.

Technology Enabled Learning (TEL) has a major impact on the learning adaptability of the learners. During the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a drastic change in the learning methodology. The adaptability of learners from the various domains, levels and age has been a significant component of research in context to education. In this paper, the authors have proposed a machine learning and explainable AI based solution to identify critical learning parameters for students' adaptability level in online education. In this research the authors have employed various explainable AI (XAI) algorithms namely Local Interpretable Model-agnostic Explanations (LIME), SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP), FEature iMportance based eXplanable AI algorithm (FAMeX) for identifying the critical learning parameters to decide the adaptability level of a student. To test the efficacy of the solution, a dataset of students of several education levels of Bangladesh, collected from both online and offline surveys has been used. The results revealed are quite interesting, and counter intuitive.

The Congregation of Holy Cross has been working on evangelisation and education in Bangladesh for more than 170 years. This study examines the educational mission of the Congregation in Bangladesh. The study is conducted from a historical perspective. The paper is based primarily on the examination of written documents -- primary and secondary -- and field work involving oral history interviews. The study identifies four primary aims of Holy Cross education in Bangladesh. The paper argues that they have distinctive educational aims at the nation's elite education both through English and Bengali medium, and villages' primary and secondary level education. The study illustrates that there has been a shift of emphasis on the educational mission over the years. A significant contribution to the changing mission of Holy Cross education has been the independence of Bangladesh. Another factor that contributed significantly to changes in Holy Cross education has been the Catholic Church itself and the structure of Catholic life, as a result of Vatican II. Mission models that emerged after the Council emphasised social justice and religious pluralism. Those teachings of the Church brought changes to the educational missions of Holy Cross in Bangladesh.

Tertiary-level students from Bangladesh usually migrate to Germany for the purpose of higher studies. These international student migrants use communication media to maintain connections with family members and friends in Bangladesh and social networks with friends, classmates, and Bangladeshi community members in Germany. Drawing on the experiences of Bangladeshi student migrants in Germany and using polymedia theory, this paper investigates how the migrant students use the polymedia environment to maintain the transnational social networks and connections. This paper is based on qualitative data derived from 18 in-depth interviews with Bangladeshi migrant students in Germany. Findings suggest that using the polymedia environment, Bachelor migrant students receive emotional support from their family members back home, while Masters and PhD students are responsible for providing emotional and practical support to their left-behind families, relatives, and friends. Migrant students' media usage with families and friends living in Bangladesh is influenced by their marital status and gender as well as their familial and social structure in Bangladesh. Their use of communication media with the members of the Bangladeshi community and foreign classmates living in Germany is comparatively less frequent and more education-oriented.

This paper aims to examine the effectiveness of e-assessment in higher education from the perspective of students, and it also examines the student's reaction to this method. There are many developing countries that have begun to explore technology-based assessment systems. The new assessment system has benefits to institutions and to students. The purpose of this paper is to understand the benefits students are receiving from e-assessment as well as the complications they are facing when institutions are adapting e-assessment and switching from traditional assessment. The paper is based on the views of a small sample of university students chosen randomly, which found mixed reactions to e-assessment. Although students appreciate the importance of e-assessment, they have some fears about technology-based examinations as all of them do not have an equal level of IT competence. Further research should be carried out to explore other aspects of e-assessment in the higher education context.

This paper aims to uncover the phenomenon of Code-switching and the motivation behind the propensity of using acrolect in code-switching among the youths of Bangladesh. In comparison to the past, switching code has become an ecumenical term of Bilingualism in this world. Countries like Bangladesh where English has been taught or used as a foreign language, people often switch the code from Bengali to English or English to Bengali. The tendency of switching code is seen mostly in the youths and young professionals in Bangladesh. Moreover, it is seen the inclination of preferring acrolect while switching the code. The paper analyzes how the youths and young professionals can safely adapt code-switching and make a positive impression on it. The study consists of both qualitative and quantitative approaches. To analyze the nature and factors of code-switching, the paper takes help from different sources and some surveys and questionnaires are completed for empirical data collection. To answer the questions, it is compared to the answers of some students and teachers from Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science & Technology University, Dinajpur and other reputed universities in Bangladesh as well. The paper will trace the role of switching code and its consequences on Bangladeshi youngsters. And the findings can be used in Sociolinguistic ground to expand the nature and scope of codeswitching. The result shows an unleashing effect of code-switching and the positive and negative attitude towards code-switching. The results answer how acrolect dominates over a speaker while switching the code and it also answers regarding the correlation between proximity to code-switching and psychology of the youths.

Contemporary technology, along with the tangible/virtual duality of present-day learner consciousness, are, in the authors' opinion, necessitating and enabling a fundamental educational transformation. A central feature of this development will be 'letting the learners lead', including (from secondary onwards) their identification of the content of their curriculum. This paper considers how this pedagogical innovation might operate in practice. Nine United Kingdom (specifically South Wales) senior secondary students were invited to decide what they would "like to learn in the coming academic year". The group then explored how their agreed set of subjects (including, for instance, Sign Language; History of Coal Mining in My Locality; Mental Health and Me; Being Ready for the Next Pandemic; Pantomime…) might best be learned. These approaches and findings were shared with, understood by, and generally supported by a group of upper secondary school students in Australia and, to a lesser extent, by another group in Bangladesh. Dialogue with a small number of professors and other United Kingdom professionals also took place. The tentative conclusions and implications are that (a) university entrance requirements are predominantly aimed at student selection rather than at covering necessary pre-tertiary knowledge; (b) if, somehow, the competitive element -- including the allocation of grades -- could be eliminated, then giving learners the opportunity to shape their curricula becomes feasible; (c) letting the learners lead is seen (by a sample of them) as realistic and (with some reservations) desirable; (d) much of this learning would involve on-line research through the confident utilisation of familiar devices and systems (i.e. how 'non-school' information is now acquired); (e) there would also be on-line and face-to-face discussions with experts and practitioners; (f) teachers, with radically restructured roles, could offer valuable coordination and encouragement; and (g) the school as 'place' (as opposed to 'process') may wither away as the transformation proceeds. The authors are keen that their provisional findings should be tested by educational planners and researchers in other educational situations across the world.

Globally, fewer students are choosing careers in science. In developing countries like Bangladesh, this attrition is often attributed to limited access to laboratories, lack of qualified science teachers, and limited use of student-centered strategies (SCS). Educators are attempting to design professional development programs to empower teachers with innovative teaching methods that will eventually boost enrolment in STEM-related fields. With this end in mind, we designed a six-month-long grant-funded project that equipped five urban schools in Bangladesh with 20 science toolkits. We also provided 20 science teachers and five site coordinators with ongoing professional development to support use of these toolkits with 109 students for inquiry-based learning (IBL). Using an explanatory sequential design, we analyzed quantitative and qualitative data from three surveys. We also used transcripts from interviews with five site coordinators and four Zoom panel presentations to understand the numeric findings. While quantitative analysis with SPSS revealed that teacher-centered strategies (TCS) continue to be widespread in Bangladesh, we noted that the IBL project influenced student outcomes in several ways. The qualitative data confirmed that teachers who receive training and support over an extended period implemented SCS quite effectively. Both quantitative and qualitative findings revealed that a shift from TCS to SCS enhanced students' ability to hypothesize, experiment, and make real-life connections. In this paper, we describe statistically significant differences in the students' knowledge across curriculum type and gender. We also describe the influence of the project on student attitudes.