From stigma to school: How community sensitization is transforming education in Bangladesh

In Bangladesh, a troubling reality is slowly changing. Driven by deep-rooted societal stigma and misunderstanding, families often keep children with disabilities hidden inside their homes. They also don’t feel the need for these children to be educated. Girls with disabilities face even greater barriers: discrimination based on both their gender and their disability means they're far less likely to attend school than boys with disabilities. 

This is why the Global Partnership for Education’s Knowledge and Innovation Exchange (GPE KIX) and Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC) have been supporting the project Bridging Gaps and Scaling Up a School Readiness Program. Building on its parent initiative called Every Newborn-Reach Up Early Education Intervention for All Children (EN-REACH) — which successfully increased children’s readiness to enter pre-primary      school — this project is vital to counter the discrimination that children with disabilities still face in accessing pre-primary education. 

Focused on inclusive early education and care, this project is helping to shape perception and action so that every child has a chance to receive an education. Implementation countries also include Nepal and Tanzania. 

In partnership with the Ministry of Primary and Mass Education, the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh — known as icddr,b — is delivering the project in Bangladesh with three main goals:

1. Enhancing teaching methods by creating disability-inclusive training manuals for pre-primary teachers.

2. Generating rigorous data to prove the intervention’s effectiveness and cost-efficiency for future scaling.

3. Improving practice as well as policy, ensuring the program becomes a sustainable, government-funded initiative in future.

Launched in 2025, the project is expected to end in 2027. Activities range from developing specialized training manuals on inclusive pedagogy and parenting to delivering training of trainers on play-based learning and disability inclusion, as well as supporting teachers to integrate inclusive practices into their classrooms and parenting sessions. One activity stands out as a key project enabler: raising awareness among parents, teachers and communities of the need to include and educate children with disabilities.

As implementing partner, icddr,b conducted community and school sensitization campaigns between March and June 2025. To reach as many community members as possible, we used different strategies: informal and localized community gatherings, home visits, targeted distribution of leaflets and posters, as well as announcements with loudspeakers. 

Importantly, we did not lead these activities and conversations ourselves. We empowered parents, schools, school management committees (SMCs) and organizations of persons with disabilities (OPDs) to co-design and lead the outreach. Specifically, we emphasized the involvement of fathers or other male family members who can influence admission decisions for children. 

When the message of inclusion comes from a trusted neighbour, it carries far more weight than when it comes from an outside researcher. As one local OPD leader noted during a meeting: “When we speak from our own lived experiences, the community listens. They don’t see us as outsiders imposing ideas; they see us as neighbours advocating for our shared future.” 

Initially, most parents wrongly believed that children with disabilities were simply incapable of learning. After community campaigns, school-level initiatives and family support, by July 2025,      82 children with various degrees of disabilities were enrolled in pre-primary classes across 24 project schools included in the project (44 children in Kushtia District in the south-west of the country and 38 in Gaibandha District in the north). 

The most profound change we have witnessed is the shift from stigma to pride. Consider Naima, a mother of a child with a disability. She said, “I used to keep my daughter hidden because neighbours whispered she was a curse. Now, I feel proud to take her to school. I know she can learn.” 

Teachers have also experienced a meaningful shift. As one local pre-primary teacher shared, “Before the sensitization activities, I was afraid I couldn't manage a child with a disability. Now, I see it is my duty to welcome them.” 

This mindset shift has been facilitated by targeted capacity building. Teachers are now equipped with foundational skills in personalized teaching methods and plans, as well as positive behaviour management that relies on encouragement and positive reinforcement. This has helped to transform their initial apprehension into actionable, inclusive teaching methods.

Historically, communication between schools and homes in these regions was only one-way: from the school to the parent. Thanks to sustained engagement, this dynamic has flipped. Parents have found their voices, transitioning from passive beneficiaries to proactive partners. This transition is partly driven by our monthly parenting sessions, which provide a dedicated, safe space for parents to learn early stimulation techniques, share their daily caregiving struggles and collectively solve problems. 

As mothers initially engaged more with project activities, including parenting sessions, separate sessions targeting fathers and grandfathers were introduced — with both driving a change in attitudes.

Additionally, teachers now recognize that achieving real progress in the classroom requires active parental cooperation. Not only that: local government representatives and SMC members have begun prioritizing inclusive education, while local media and OPDs are holding schools accountable.

Naturally, scaling any intervention presents practical hurdles. Our implementation research highlighted two unexpected challenges: 

• The expectation contradiction. As community awareness grew, so did parental expectations, which sometimes clashed with the slow pace of systemic change. We found that parents, newly convinced of their child’s potential, became frustrated when the broader school infrastructure and the school practices did not immediately adapt to their child’s specific learning needs, threatening to reverse early enrollment gains. 

• The terminology trap. We discovered that using the specific word “disability” in campaign materials occasionally backfired. Parents of children without disabilities mistakenly assumed the campaign was entirely irrelevant to them, leading to a wider community disengagement.

To ensure future sensitization activities succeed and scale, our field data points to three clear recommendations: 

1. Engage both parents. We must engage family decision-makers – with a particular focus on fathers. In Bangladesh, deeply ingrained gender norms often transfer early childhood care and parenting tasks exclusively to mothers, resulting in extremely low participation from fathers. Addressing fathers’ specific doubts and easing them into active caregiving roles through empathetic, continuous dialogue is the most effective way to build trust and drive school enrollment.
2. Adapt campaign materials. We need to reframe the terminology so that inclusive education is seen as a universal benefit for all children, not just an issue for those with disabilities and their families. To bring in all children, the project is actively shifting its messaging to highlight how inclusive teaching methods, like play-based learning and individualized attention, can improve educational outcomes for every child in the classroom, thereby fostering a universally supportive learning environment.
3. Pair awareness with tangible action. Awareness alone is not enough to guarantee enrollment. Parents need to see physical proof of inclusion – like ramps, assistive devices and visibly welcoming, trained teachers – before they feel safe sending their children to school. As one father who recently enrolled his daughter shared, “I wanted to believe she could go to school, but it wasn’t until I saw the ramp built at the entrance and the teacher sitting down patiently to welcome her that I finally felt she would be safe.”

As the implementing partner, we have seen that targeted community sensitization can do much more than just raise awareness. Done well, it can dismantle the walls of stigma that prevent children with disabilities from accessing early education. By refining our communication strategies, learning from practical challenges and fostering true parent-teacher partnerships, we can build school readiness programs that are truly sustainable and inclusive. For all children.