Meet Kutub, a 17-year-old boy from Haldia Palang union in the Ukhia sub-district of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. In 2023, he dropped out of school at grade 8 due to his family’s financial crisis.

Kutub’s father used to earn a living driving a three-wheeler - a small, motorized vehicle used for public or private transportation - but got into an accident and suffered a spinal injury, which limits his work opportunities.

His mother is a housewife, and his elder brother works as the Imam of the nearby mosque, earning a limited income to support their family.

Unable to afford school fees, Kutub dropped out and soon fell into a cycle of frustration and bad company. He turned to drugs, and members of his community distanced themselves from him.

Realizing he needed to turn his life around, Kutub knew it was time for a change.

A window of opportunity

In 2024, Kutub heard from a friend about a program where school dropouts can learn vocational trade for six months free of cost.

The Skills-Focused Literacy for Out-of-School Adolescents (SKILFO) program, implemented by the Government of Bangladesh’s Bureau of Non-Formal Education with financial support from GPE and technical support from UNICEF, offers out-of-school 14-to-18-year-olds a second chance.

Participants develop literacy, numeracy, life and vocational skills, and the program offers the first ever standardized pre-vocational courses in high-growth sectors like IT, hospitality, light engineering and construction.

Without hesitation, Kutub enrolled in the refrigeration and air conditioning course offered by the Bureau of Non-Formal Education using the facility in the Rumkha madrassa (an Islamic educational institution).

“This training helped me a lot in getting into a more disciplined life, learn new things and see things from practical perspective,” Kutub said. He chose this trade as he felt that there was greater scope of work in this field and fewer skilled people.

A natural talent with electronics, he passed the training and immediately after completion, got job placement as a graduate learner in the Singer repair workshop as an AC Servicing Operator in Court Bazar, the heart of Haldia Palang union.

Kutub works four days a week on average and earns around Taka 5,000 (approximately US$41) per month: “This is not much, but it is a good start. After meeting my own expenses, I can now give at least a token amount to my family.”

His training instructor, Ashraful Haque Arif, said, “He has endless possibilities of growth as he is a very keen and quick learner.” He added that Kutub has received basic training, but with greater workplace experience and advanced training, he can attain new heights of success.

Kutub now walks around in his community with his head held high, and people see him as a positive example.

Elaborating on his future goals, he said, “I want to learn more through work and later avail an advanced training in order to work in a big industry or set up my own establishment.”

Skills courses for a variety of interests

The skills-focused literacy courses prepare students for jobs in a range of sectors.

The most popular courses are tailoring and dress making, followed by computer (app and graph) and electrical installation and maintenance.

Other courses include consumer electronics, mobile phone servicing, plumbing and pipe fitting, refrigeration and air conditioning, auto mechanics, masonry and rod binding, aluminum fabrication, food and beverage, beauty care and front desk management.

For 17-year-old Shama, her pathway to employment was the 6-month food and beverage services and management training at Cox’s Bazar Polytechnic Institute.

Shama hails from a remote village in Banderban district, north of Cox’s Bazar. She comes from an indigenous family consisting of two brothers, three sisters and her mother.

Shama had to drop out of school in grade 7 after her father’s death left her family in extreme poverty, especially as he had left them with some debts.

They barely managed to survive in their remote village through “joom” cultivation – a traditional method of farming in the hilly regions of Bangladesh. They were also systematically looked down upon and ridiculed in the community for their poverty and inability to repay debts.

One day, Shama met someone at a tea stall in her village who informed her about the skills-focused literacy program and put her in touch with a Field Monitoring Assistant of the program for more details.

Upon discussing the opportunity with her family, she successfully underwent the food and beverage training and was given a job at Shalik, a restaurant in Cox’s Bazar.

She works from 2pm to 10pm, sometimes even more, depending on the flow of customers, and earns around Taka 7,000 (approximately $58) per month. Additionally, she gets food and accommodation free of cost from her employer.

Extremely satisfied with her performance, her employer promoted Shama to the post of Junior Waiter. “I have been working in this restaurant for a very long time, but seldom have I come across anyone as hardworking and honest as Shama,” said Mehedi Hasan, Assistant General Manager of Shalik.

Shama’s sister - Rani (18) - also took the same training and is working alongside her in the same restaurant with equal pay.

With the sisters’ joint income, the family is far better off than before. Their younger sister can now go to school, and they are gradually repaying the debt their father left them with.

The people in their community who once looked down upon them, now see them as inspirational role models.

Education and skills development in a humanitarian crisis

Cox’s Bazar is a southeastern coastal city a few kilometers from the border with Myanmar.

Since 2017, around 1 million members of the Rohingya community have found refuge in camps throughout the Cox’s Bazar district, and more than half are children. It’s the biggest settlement of forcibly displaced people in the world.

Since the mass influx of refugees, GPE has supported Bangladesh to address the humanitarian crisis. Funding of $8.3 million from 2018-2022 helped expand immediate access to equitable learning opportunities for 76,000 children in Cox’s Bazar.

GPE funding of $10.7 million for 2023-2025 is helping sustain and accelerate government efforts to ensure that refugees and host community children have access to quality education and skills development.

In host communities, 6,825 out-of-school adolescents have participated in skill-focused courses and many, like Kutub and Shama, are now in income-generating activities.

The program has also trained almost 400 institutional trainers and teachers and 1,240 master craft persons (owners at the shops/enterprises) to lead the courses.

The program’s success has led to a national scale-up of skills-focused literacy training for out-of-school adolescents throughout Bangladesh.

Building on what works, the government and partners are expanding access to quality education and skills development, preparing youth to be productive members of society.

For young people like Kutub and Shama, learning a trade has been transformative, proving that with the right support, even the most challenging circumstances can lead to a brighter future.