Rendezvous with Dr. Anis

(published @ Daily Star - July 22, 2007)

Dr. Kazi Anis Ahmed is the Director of Academic Affairs at the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh (ULAB). He was born in Dhaka and educated in St. Joseph High School and Notre Dame College. He completed higher studies at Brown, Washington and New York universities in America, receiving a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the last place.
G. Sumdany Don and Feeda Hasan Shahed talks to Dr. Anis about ULAB, its vision and its future.

Dr. Anis believes the reason that the board of directors of Gemcon Group, who also happen to be the members of the board of governors of ULAB, came forward in the higher education sector of this country mainly for their personal passion for education and culture and also because of their strong desire to give back to society.

Dr. Anis cleared out one interesting misunderstanding. Some of us think that the western universities all have huge open spaces and playgrounds whereas the private universities of Dhaka are all confined in buildings. He explained from his personal experience of being a city student of PhD in New York for seven years, and other great cities of the world, that there are 2 kinds of campuses. In abroad, when we talk about a campus we often talk about the rural or at least the suburban setting where it is possible to have huge cracks of land for setting up an idealistic campus. But the truth is, if someone goes to New York or London, he or she will find city universities often do not have any campus! The overwhelming majority of private universities and collages in New York and London are confined in buildings, just like here at Dhaka. So people who have the expectation that Dhaka city should have huge green campuses are confusing the two models.

On asking about the name Liberal Arts, Dr Anis explained that liberal arts is a very inclusive concept and has its roots in classical education in the renaissance of the Roman period. It was called Artis Liberalis, which means it was the education of liberated and free people whereas the people who were not elite or free, got guild education in the crafts and trades. In modern times this concept of the liberal arts is most developed in America. ULAB has heavily modified this concept for Bangladesh's social realities. What it means is an education in which the students are certainly given the technical and major skills to succeed in today's highly computerized and global economy, but are also given some fundamental skills that will stand the test of time and some foundations in real intellectual practice. The main goal is to enable more than learning in a particular subject, the ability to keep on learning. He gave examples of the computer studies subject, which did not exist as a subject 20 years ago, and plenty of people from other fields have later gone into it and succeeded, but we don't know what other fields are coming in the next 20 years. So somebody who has the ability to learn is more competitive than someone who has just learned one thing and cant learn anything else.

Dr. Anis also shared his views about the biggest problem that nearly all the private universities of Bangladesh are facing the level of English. He is disappointed over the fact that the students who are graduating HSC these days have a foundation in English far below what is needed at any university. It is actually not possible to fix this with just one year of remedial English what has not been done right in 12 years of schooling. However, ULAB has instituted a one year long Basic English program for incoming undergraduates and place them in courses according to their level.

One unique thing about ULAB is the number of clubs it holds. Currently it has 14 different clubs, one of the highest among all the private universities of Bangladesh. It is also known that clubs and extra curricular activities are mandatory for all ULAB students and marks are also allocated on club performance. Dr. Anis explained that he sees co-curricular activities as an integral part of the education that a young man or woman receives at this point of their lives.

ULAB, undoubtedly, is doing a great job in creating future leaders. Dr. Anis looked very positive and has an optimistic view of the future. Ten years from now, he wants to see the ULAB graduates as free, independent and personally fulfilled individuals. In professional and real terms somebody might be an executive of a global company posted in Toronto or Sydney, somebody could be running their own business or an NGO in Bangladesh, and somebody could be a teacher. He would love to see someone becoming an educated farmer! He hopes that someone will go back to their home district and run an organic garden, they would teach at the local school and they would be the happiest citizens of all. He concludes by saying this with a smile, “There is no single destiny for ULAB students, but we hope they will all live by the principles of freedom, creativity and service.”

G. Sumdany Don is a 3rd year student, Dept. of Media Studies and Journalism, ULAB. Feeda Hasan Shahed is one of the members of the Star Campus team.