Blog & News

The National Girls Programming Contest 2017 has started offcially today with the Online Preliminary Test here goo.gl/CEXO0G. In response to the online registration form circulated and accepted from March 16 to 31, we got 388 team from 73 universities from all over Bangladesh. 

After the primary selection, we selected 362 teams for the online test and given them the unique ID & Password. The selected 120 teams from this contest will be invited for the national contest designed to be held on the end of this month.

Besides, there will be 5 awareness raising workshop at 5 different universities in Bangladesh staring from 15th and will be continued till 25. 

The Information and Communication Technology Division has been arranging this contest for its 2nd time with the implementation partner Bangladesh Open Source Network and Academic Partner CodeMarshal.

The details can be found here: www.facebook.com.bdosn or http://www.nhspc.org/2017/ngpc/about/.

With a colorful and cheerful celebration, the National High School Programming Contest (NHSPC) 2017 has just turned its curtain down on 8^th April 2017 at Krishibid Institute of Bangladesh (KIB), Dhaka. A total number of 1200 winners from 16 regions and upozilas participated in the Gala event.

In the morning at 9 of the clock, the ICT State Minister Mr. Zunaid Ahmed Palak of the Information and Communication Technology Division of Bangladesh Government inaugurated the ceremony. There he motivated the young kids participants and shared that by 2021, with the prudent leadership of Honorable Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Bangladesh will be a Digital Country where the present participants will have to lead it towards the global platform.

The programming contest held in two parts; one at IIT, Dhaka University with the senior students and another one is at Daffodil University, Dhaka with the junior participants. The programming quiz and question-answer session were conducted by Munir Hasan, the General Secretary of BdOSN and Lafifa Jamal, the Chairperson of Robotics and Mechatronics Department, Dhaka University.

The closing ceremony of NHSPC-2017 started at 4pm at KIB with the presence of Mr. Zunaid Ahmed Palak, State Minister of the ICT Ministry as Chief Guest, Additional Secretary of the ministry Md. Harunur Rashid, Muhammed Zafar Iqbal Sir from SUST and so on.

110 National Winners were awarded the prizes. They will be getting some residential training on Dhaka from where they will be choosing on their performance basis to perform at the International Informatics Olympiad to be held in Tehran, Iran.

This national competition was implemented by Bangladesh Open Source Network (BdOSN) with the judging partner CodeMarshal. The relevant information is available at www.fb.com/nhspc and www.fb.com/groups/nhspc

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) division of the government initiated third edition of computer programming contest for school-goers to inspire in computer learning on March 9 and has been completed 16 regional and 3 upazila events in last one month.

Around twenty thousand students participated in the events in Jessore, Khulna, Dhaka, Comilla, Noakhali, Chittagong, Sylhet, Gopalgonj, Patuakhali, Pabna, Rajshahi, Rangpur, Dinajpur, Tangail, Mymensingh, Barisal, Saidpur of Nilphamari Singra of Natore and Anowara of Chittagong. The 1,200 winners of the contests will crowd in capital in grade finale.

National-level quiz on programming and award ceremony will be held at Krishibid Institute at Farmegate area and grand finale of programming contest will take place in two different venues of Information Technology Institute of Dhaka University and Daffodil International University.

ICT State Minister Zunaid Ahmed Palak is scheduled to present at the award ceremony while Additional secretary of ICT Division Harunur Rashid, Prof MuhammdZafor Iqbal, BUET Prof Mohammad Kaykobad and Bangladesh Open Source Network General Secretary MunirHasan attended in different sessions in the day-long event.

Regarding the event, ICT State Minister Zunaid Ahmed Palak said Bangladesh has taken different initiative to skilled up human resources in computer programming as demand of coder has been increased in pace of time.

“Programming contest at high school level brought a difference experience where we found the unsung coding talents across the country can triumph title if they being nursed well. The contest became a platform of the little plants in programming in Bangladesh,” Palak said.

The junior minister also informed that the Bangladesh team of International Informatix-2017 to be held in Tehran in Iran will be selected from the national winners of the NHSPC-2017.

BDoSN General Secretary Munir Hasan said Bangladesh need ‘a large number’ of programmers to lead the technology-based state in future and NHSPC only contribute to pave the way for young programming talents.

There has been using the international automotive judge engine Code Martial and real time update of the event are published on social media and official internet address of www.nhspc.org.

It’s should be mentioned that ICT division of the government has been organizing the national level contest to develop world-class programme from Bangladesh to lead future challenges. Bangladesh Computer Council and BDoSN are associates while computer science departments of different universities role as local host.  

Around 900 students from different schools in Rangpur participated in the regional National High School Programming Contest (NHSPC) arranged at Begum Rokeya University Rangpur on 14^th March 2017. To create a programming awareness among the school children, the ICT Division of Bangladesh has been arranging this camp since the last two years.

However, the contest was categorized into two parts: programming and quiz. 69 participants were announced as winners who were handed over certificate and medal by Md. Shorfuddin Ahmed Jhontu, Mayor of Rangpur City Corporation and Md. Saiful Rahman Saif, the additional superintendent of Police, Rangpur.

The vice-chancellor of the university Professor Dr. A.K.M Nur-un-Nabbi encouraged the participants with his good words and urged them to be the leaders of the digital world.

The ICT Division of Bangladesh Government has arranged this initiative for its third time to popularize computer programming among the school children. The winners from the regional contests will participate in the National contest and after a series of selection from there; the students will be awarded to participate in the International Informatics Olympiad.

Bangladesh Open Source Network is the implementation partner while Code Marshal is the judging partner of National High School Programming Contest 2017. 

To learn more about the programming contests, please visit www.nhspc.org or https://www.facebook.com/nhspcbd/  

Language and communication barriers are some common problems for the BPO industry in Bangladesh. It has also been found in some recent studies that if we can emphasize on the ‘call center jargon’, the call centers agents' communication will be more easier and convenient. There are some contents available on the internet but these are not enough to meet our contextual problems. So, it needs to study from the baseline of the usage and demand of the respective language and develop a complete and contextual guide.

In this circumstance, we need to identify the language barriers and develop a suitable discourse for the abovementioned group of people. Keeping that in mind, we are conducting a thourough research in association with the ICT Dividion of Bangladesh Government in the related fields aiming to develop a proper content that would be effective to create a resourceful staffs and harness the development of BPO in Bangladesh.

Data Collection: Call Center Visit & Focus Group Discussion

We visited 4 call centers located in Dhaka named- FIFO Tech, Winmill Bangladesh, My Outsourcing Limited and Genex Infosys.

At the FIFO Tech, two of us visited and stayed there for one and thirty minutes while we were busy with the observation, recording and taking notes on the conversation the stuff were having with the customers/clients on other side of the headphones.  The stuffs made all outbound calls while they were taking guidelines from a written script on screen.

On the other hand, during our visit for one and twenty minutes at the Winmill Bangladesh, we observed both inbound and outbound calls and followed the similar tools to record the raw data.

Moreover, in the My Outsourcing Limited, we observed 10 inbound calls and took notes the necessary. We arranged a FGD with 7 females and 1 male where the participants discussed with the challenges they faced initially and the lacking should be met up soon. They have been in this service for 7 month to more than one year and thus we have got a different opinion from them. (See the attachment C for FGD questions). We also conducted a FGD at Genex Infosys in participation of 7 male employees there. Along with one Assistant Training Manager and one Assistant Quality Assurance Manager, there were 5 call center agents who are in this job for the last 3-4 years.

In the inbound calls, the stuffs were attending a call on demand and continuing the conversation based on the client’s queries.

The purpose of the visit was to observe the real conversation between the call centers stuff and the customer/ client. This enriched our understanding of the practical discourse in a call centers.

Apart from call center visit & FGD, we have analyzed call centers audio files, studied literatures and met with linguistics to get an insightful data on this. However, we hope successfully completion of this research would be a potential resource for BPO industry and help it to take to the next level. 

It was a cheerful ending with around 2,000 school children who participated in the National High School Programming Contest Regional camp at Pabna University of Science and Technology and Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science & Technology University on 13th March 2017.

Professor Dr. Al-Nakib Chowdhury, the Vice-Chancellor of Pabna University of Science and Technology and Professor Md. Abul Kashesm, Vice-Chancellor of Hajee Mohammad Danesh Science & Technology University inaugurated the camp in the morning.

The programming contest was held in two categories while the ICT Quiz was in total three categories. 70 participants from Dinajpur and 54 from Pabna were announced as winners and they were handed over the gifts by the present guests. Before, they answered many interesting and challenging questions regarding programming and ICT  asked by the little participants.  

 The ICT Division of Bangladesh Government has arranged this initiative for its third time to popularize computer programming among the school children. The winners from the regional contests will participate in the National contest and after a series of selection from there; the students will be awarded to participate in the International Informatics Olympiad.

Bangladesh Open Source Network is the implementation partner while Code Marshal is the judging partner of National High School Programming Contest 2017. 

To learn more about the programming contests, please visit www.nhspc.org or  https://www.facebook.com/nhspcbd/  

Computer programming is going to be the best resource to change the world in the coming days. To be a skilled programmer, one needs to practice it from the very beginning of his/her life. A student must learn coding as mandatory as it is taken for Bangla, English and Science.

After the successful completion of NHSPC 2015 and 2016, this time the arrangement is going to be in a bigger scale around the country. Already the regional programming contests have been started all over Bangladesh. For example, the contests have been arranged on 9th, 10th and 12th March in Jessore Science and Technology University, Khulna University of Engineering & Technology and Rajshahi University respectively. Around 3,000 school children participated in the quiz contests. Professor Mohammad Abdus Sattar, the Vice-Chancellor of Jessore University, Professor Mohammad Alamgir, the Vice-Chancellor of Khulna University, Pro-vice-chancellor Professor Chowdhury Sarwat Jahan, the Chancellor Dr. Rafiqul Alam Beg from Rajshahi Science and Technology University were present in the opening and closing days.

The students studying in class 6 to class 12 actively participated in programming quiz and programming contest. 203 participants got selected for the national programming contest.

The ICT Division of Bangladesh Government has arranged this initiative for its third time to popularize computer programming among the school children. The winners from the regional contests will participate in the National contest and after a series of selection from there; the students will be awarded to participate in the International Informatics Olympiad.

Bangladesh Open Source Network is the implementation partner while Code Marshal is the judging partner of National High School Programming Contest 2017. 

Computer programming is going to be the best resource to change the world in the coming days. To be a skilled programmer, one needs to practice it from the very beginning of his/her life. A student must learn coding as mandatory as it is taken for Bangla, English and Science.

After the successful completion of NHSPC 2015 and 2016, this time the arrangement is going to be in a bigger scale around the country. Already the regional programming contests have been started all over Bangladesh. For example, the contests have been arranged on 9^th, 10^th and 12^th March in Jessore Science and Technology University, Khulna University of Engineering & Technology and Rajshahi University respectively. Around 3,000 school children participated in the quiz contests. Professor Mohammad Abdus Sattar, the Chancellor of Jessore University, Professor Mohammad Alamgir, the Chancellor of Khulna University, Pro-vice-chancellor Professor Chowdhury Sarwat Jahan, the Chancellor Dr. Rafiqul Alam Beg from Rajshahi Science and Technology University were present in the opening and closing days.

The students studying in class 6 to class 12 actively participated in programming quiz and programming contest. 203 participants got selected for the national programming contest.

The ICT Division of Bangladesh Government has arranged this initiative for its third time to popularize computer programming among the school children. The winners from the regional contests will participate in the National contest and after a series of selection from there; the students will be awarded to participate in the International Informatics Olympiad.

Bangladesh Open Source Network is the implementation partner while Code Marshal is the judging partner of National High School Programming Contest 2017. 

It was a very interactive session titled 'Bringing More Girls and Women in ICT' on 5th March 2017 at EMK Center. The session was arranged to celebrate the International Women’s Day with country’s leading personnel, women and men. Bangladesh Open Source Network (BdOSN) had arranged this session with a vibrant participation from different backgrounds of students, entrepreneurs, would-be entrepreneurs and service holders.

The program was started at 5:30pm and continues for next 2 hours. The aim of the session was to encourage girls and women to increase their active involvement in ICT sectors. It was designed a regular motivational program under #missingdaughter initiative of the organization.

Sharmin Kabir, Research Associate & Program Officer of BdOSN started the seminar with an introductory presentation on #missingdaughter where she shared the reasons of taking such initiative, the events and activities taken, struggles and achievements so far with a plan designed for future. She said that ‘we have been learning every day throughout the last 1.5 year journey of #missingdaughter and shaping the program better for the future.’

Lafifa Jamal, Chairperson of Department of Robotics & Mechatronics Engineering,University of Dhaka-RMEDU moderated the session. She also is the vice-president of BdOSN. Her sharing came out with the struggles she has been experiencing to encourage the girls and women in ICT sector. 

There was a pool of panelists including; Farhana A Rahman, Vice-President of BASIS, Senior Vice-President of BASIS, Munir Hasan, General Secretary of BdOSN, Farhana Nazneen, CEO of Jereve Consultant, Nasima Akter Nisha, Director of Corporate Affairs and Achia Nila, Founder of Women in Digital.

Throughout their discussion, they share their personal, professional and moral stories to inspire the participants to be in the ICT.

The participants did enjoy the session. They also spontaneously were sharing their queries, questions and thoughts and asking for suggestion in different topic. The most interesting part was the young participants' eagerness to continue the session even the time crossed its point.