MIRPUR MUSIC PROGRAM
Dhaka, Bangladesh
Creating positive change through music education
Dhaka, Bangladesh
Since January 2015, the Playing For Change Foundation has been working in the slums of Mirpur District of Dhaka, Bangladesh, to provide music education to underprivileged children. In this district, 32% of residents live below the national poverty line of $2 per day and child malnutrition rates are 48%. Illiteracy rates are among the highest in the world.
Free and adapted music classes and music performances are being integrated into the curriculum of three existing education centers which are locally run by our program partner SpaandanB. The organization sprouted from the vision of a handful of expatriate Bangladeshi in 1998, and it is dedicated to better the lives of the less advantaged people in Bangladesh. SpaandanB initiates and implements projects in the areas of education, health care, and promotion of sustained subsistence. Approximately 250 children aged 5 to 12 years old are being served by this program.
6 teachers provide more than 150 hours of music instruction per month. Children are being taught musicalization, rhythm exercises, and traditional songs. In addition to music instruction, interdisciplinary work is being introduced using music to help students improve vocabulary, reading and pronunciation.
Located North East of Dakah, Mirpur has over 1 million inhabitants and contains many slums and poor areas, but is also where the Grameen Bank (Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohammad Yunu's microfinance organization) has its headquarters.
Culture and environment are very intertwined here in M’hamid. The weather turns from blistering hot in the summer (reaching 130 degrees Farenheit regularly in July and August) to sandstorm season in March and April, which helps to propagate the date palm trees, the economic power in the region. Climate change is a very real presence locally, with little access to water becoming normal, and the encroachment of sand dunes onto precious farmland happening right now, working to disperse not only communities, but ancient traditions with them.
In M’hamid there is a great importance placed on the community and people moving together in groups. Whether it be families of 10 living under the same roof eating from the same central Tagine dish for their meals, or the ritual of preparing and sharing tea with whomever may be around, foreigner or local, the sense of inclusion is vital to the community. The passing down of music and poetry from generation to generation is another vital aspect of the community, as art and tradition serve as reassurances in a constantly changing world. It is the role of the youngest generation to learn from the past to bring the traditional Saharan art into future, so at to coexist with the modern.
OR SEND AN EMAIL TO info@playingforchange.org
OR SEND AN EMAIL TO info@playingforchange.org
OR SEND AN EMAIL TO info@playingforchange.org
