NGO Education Survey

Banking for Small Enterprises

This course is uniquely designed to train students on credit facilities for small enterprises. It discusses how to serve effectively the small business clients and build and sustain relationship banking. Topics include: Small and Medium Enterprise development, planning for small business, communicating with small business owners, understanding effective sales management, agribusiness financing, differential credit analysis techniques using case studies, risk rating system, etc. The course also examines the role of strategic thinking for bankers to a) attract new businesses and consumers, b) retain loyal customers, c) efficiently deliver products and services, d) enhance commitment to employees, community and shareholders.

Basic Statistics for Development Research

The course aims at offering some statistical basic (e.g. measures of central tendency, dispersion and sampling technique) specifically related to quantitative research, with an immediate application during the field work and for project work preparation. Students are expected to learn SPSS in this course as well as to interpret statistical tables, design samples, use basis statistics to validate information, etc.

Economics for Development

Part I of this course focuses on structural shifts in demand and production costs; Markets and Market Failures; how, when and why markets fail; the role of government in a deregulated environment; the role of competitive strategies and game theory; the experience of special markets, for example, water and energy. Part II of this course focuses on how to achieve national economic growth and control inflation in the context of a global economy, with special attention to policy formulation and implementation and the dilemmas facing decision-makers in the government and private sectors and the role of development organizations in delivery of public goods. Professionals in domestic and international organizations will find this course to be useful to the formulation of strategies.

Issues in Development Economics

The course will explore the related themes of Economic Growth and Development. The course will analyze economic institutions in developing countries focusing around the themes of ''Markets, Institutions and Welfare'' and "Public Policy and Welfare". Failures in key markets such as those for land, labor, credit and insurance have far reaching implications both for productive efficiency and welfare. The story of economic development is, in many ways, one of how informal, imaginative institutions have evolved to fill the gaps left by these market failures. The course will study how institutions have evolved to cope with missing markets, and how they affect the allocation and the distribution of resources. The course will analyze both the channel through which the institutional environment affects efficiency and welfare and how public policy can be designed to increase welfare and growth. The course has a strong applied focus. Under each section, a student is required to derive testable implications from the theory, subject these to econometric testing, comment on the robustness of the results obtained and draw out policy conclusions.

Micro Finance: Theory, Principles and Performance

The Course aims at an acquaintance with the definition, concept, components, operations of micro finance and significant difference it has made to the life and living of the poor. The effectiveness of and effects on existing intermediaries and on the natural and socio-economic environment are also analyzed. Special emphasis is laid on the forms of financial intermediation known as MFIs/ non-banking financial institutions/(micro-finance intermediaries). Financial intermediation demand will also be considered in connection to anthropological and sociological aspects, which helps understanding customers’ preferences in respect of financial instruments. Topics include: necessity of micro credit in poverty alleviation, controversy over the interest rate charged by the microfinance institutions, assessment of the micro credit programs as well as the provider institutions, empowerment and mainstreaming of the disadvantaged groups including women, future challenges facing microfinance and achievements of microfinance in Bangladesh, regulatory framework for an efficient and transparent delivery of microfinance institutions shall be discussed as well.

Philosophy and Forms of Development and Governance

Public Sector, Corporate entities, Private Voluntary Development Organizations (PVDOs), Non-government Organizations (NGOs) and other community organizations have become important agents of growth, development and social changes. This course identifies and examines the relevance of effective management through integrated governance such as interdependence and interaction of all spheres of governance, interrelationship of the public sector with business, civil society and citizens as well as other public sector entities and Civil Sector Governance. The course includes management system of such organizations and explores optimal thoughts in organizational design, accountability, governance and public participation. It aims at evolving administrative skills for planning, organizing, staffing, administering the staff, coordinating and controlling skills for management of PVDOs, NGOs, Public Sector Organization etc. It also includes design and interpretation of basic financial statements of cash flow, internal external reporting, identification of development projects, funding and revenue generating activities.

Program and Project Analysis and Design

The course deals with the basic concept of a project in an institutional framework and various measures of benefits and costs analysis like Cost: Benefit Analysis, Net Present Value (NPV), Internal Rate of Return as well as internalization of externalities. It also covers various methods of project appraisal under differing goals framework of project proposal - logical framework (log frame) analysis - project monitoring and evaluation with special reference to practice and culture of project planning system in Bangladesh.

Project Management and Implementation

The course aims at developing skills for and attitudes towards management, monitoring and evaluation of development programs and projects. Particular emphasis is given to an understanding of an implementation time, resource and progress scheduling for simple as well as multi-faceted projects of higher complexity. The critical aspects of ensuring high quality project management as these relate to timely completion, cost controls, continuous monitoring and evaluating teamwork; leadership and structure of the project are also highlighted. Identification of problems, listing of risks and other concerns shall be specifically addressed in the course, which may include case study illustrations. MS Project will be used to teach this course.

Sociology and Social Anthropology of Development

Basic sociological and anthropological concepts of societal institutions and rural communities; causes and consequences of social change. Social difference and inequality: forms and dimensions of difference; how these are expressed; their basis and how they are reproduced; how they vary and fit together. Living together: units and modes of belonging; dynamics in relationship; links with social inequality. Thinking, knowing and acting: consciousness and empowerment; culture and ideology; identity and subjectivity. Dynamics of Change: environmental dimensions; endogenous/exogenous factors; making change happen through violence/non-violence; policies, organizations and projects.

Studies of Governance and Development Organizations

The course highlights the philosophical aspects of governance and development with greater emphasis on local governance and participatory development. It scrutinizes the three forms of developmental organization: market mechanism, bureaucratic or hierarchical system and the community dynamics. The course also covers the propelling forces of the political economy of development: reasons, justifications and effects of government intervention in development process as well as its sustainability to substitute markets. The course also analyses the links through which the NGOs and PVDOs relate to the bureaucracy and other state mechanism and how the government itself may supplement its efforts by using NGOs/PVDOs in developing public services.

Studies of Governance and Development Organizations

The course highlights the philosophical aspects of governance and development with greater emphasis on local governance and participatory development. It scrutinizes the three forms of developmental organization: market mechanism, bureaucratic or hierarchical system and the community dynamics. The course also covers the propelling forces of the political economy of development: reasons, justifications and effects of government intervention in development process as well as its sustainability to substitute markets. The course also analyses the links through which the NGOs and PVDOs relate to the bureaucracy and other state mechanism and how the government itself may supplement its efforts by using NGOs/PVDOs in developing public services.

Sustainable Development and Livelihoods

This course reviews current models, claiming to capture the multi-dimensionality of sustainable livelihoods analysis, especially in terms of the interaction between different sets of resources, assets and activities. These models are enriched by key theoretical debates about the relationship between forms of capital: human, social and natural. It deploys an umbrella framework of institutional responsibility to explore the combination of options (personal, familial and wider institutional levels) available for people's agency. It therefore considers the spatial framing of sustainable development and especially the boundary between private and public behavior, requiring different time preferences and types of institutional performance (market/collective action). These themes are revealed through discussion of empirical cases referring to life cycles, crises, inter-generational bargains, peasant analogues, pursuit of security, common property management, migration (local and global), rural-urban linkages, conservation strategies of essential natural resources.

Sustainable Development: Policies and Tools

This course examines alternative conceptions and theoretical underpinnings of "sustainable development" as well as “sustainable human development.� It focuses on the sustainability problems of industrial countries (i.e., aging of populations, sustainable consumption, institutional adjustments, etc.); and of developing countries (i.e., managing growth, sustainability of production patterns, conservation and regeneration of resources, pressures of population change, etc.). It also explores the sociology of knowledge around sustainability, the economic and technological dimensions and institutional imperatives. Implications for political constitution of economic performance.