A pre-departure ceremony was organised on 18 June 2017 by the British Council at its Dhaka University campus office for Bangladeshi students selected for the Summer Cricket and Leadership Programme to be conducted by the Oxford International Education Group in the United Kingdom.
During the two months summer programme, which will be held in July and August, the students will participate in cricket master classes where an English coach will train them and provide them lessons in cricket. They will also get the opportunity to play club cricket and to visit iconic places in Oxford and Cambridge. Moreover, they will partake in a two-week English and leadership programme where they will learn grammar, vocabulary, debate and six lessons in leadership skills.
This year, a total of 50 students have been selected for the programme. They will be divided into two teams consisting of 29 members each, led by a member, who will be a teacher of the respective schools of the students. Moreover, the entire group will be accompanied by three officials two from the schools along with a local representative of Oxford International Group.
The programme was initiated last year in Bangladesh by the British Council. This year, the British Council circulated information regarding the program around schools in Bangladesh, and organised informative briefing sessions for school counsellors. A total 18 schools participated in the session, many of which showed interest to participate. Oxford International School and Delhi Public School, two highly renowned schools, showed interest first and provided the maximum number of students. The programme being divided into two phases, the first phase consists of students of these two schools.
The Summer School Programme is an integral part of the education system in the developed world because of its design which educates young students and equips them with extracurricular skills to develop them into productive and intellectually enriched members of the society.