Hot classes, spoiled lunch:
Extreme heat make school a trial for Bangladesh’s students
By Mosabber Hossain
The sun was directly overhead as Sumona Sardin and her 11-year-old son walked home from his school, their faces flushed and sweating, both feeling exhausted.
Mid-day temperatures in Bangladesh’s capital had risen to 41 degrees Celsius (106 degrees Fahrenheit), but they strode along quickly, needing to get home on foot in time for a tutoring session, after a traffic jam blocked other transport options.
Sardin, clad in a black dress, headscarf and face covering, said increasingly scorching temperatures are creating a miserable life for many students in Dhaka - and their parents and teachers.
“The extreme heat makes my child so tired that he can’t sleep well. When he goes to school he already feels exhausted. The school building is also old and the fans don’t work properly,” she said, as the pair walked home together sheltered from the sun only by a pink umbrella.
“The city’s heat is making our lives unbearable,” she said.
Increasing severe and frequent heatwaves in Bangladesh - and in many other places around the world - are a growing challenge for education systems not built for them.
Many schools lack air conditioning, fans or even windows that allow for sufficient air flow. Key exams often happen in hot periods of the year. School lunches are spoiling as temperatures soar. Sports are being curtailed and sweltering conditions are making it hard for both students and teachers to focus while they are in classrooms.
Last year, as temperatures soared to 42 degrees Celsius (108F) for three weeks over much of Bangladesh, the country’s schools closed nationwide for two weeks, leaving 33 million children out of classes, according to Save the Children, an international child-focused charity. This year schools have not closed, but Eid holidays have been extended.
Globally, about 171 million students saw their schools temporarily shut down as a result of extreme heat last year, with Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, the Philippines and Thailand particularly hard hit, according to a January 2025 report by UNICEF, the United Nations children’s fund.
Sweaty transport
For many children in Dhaka, simply traveling to and from classes in hot conditions is a trial.
Dhanmondi, a Dhaka residential area, is full of schools. It is busy - and sometimes gridlocked - during parts of the day, with throngs of vehicles and rickshaws carrying children and their parents to classes.
Habiba Begum was sweltering even before she arrived at school with her 12-year-old daughter, having climbed out of a “laguna”, a crowded people-hauler truck with rows of benches in the back and a tarp overhead.
“It’s always hot inside, and many people squeeze into the tiny space. … It becomes extremely hot and suffocating,” she said. But more comfortable transport is too expensive, she said.
Begum’s home, five kilometres from the school, also has little open space around it for air to flow, which means “when the weather is extremely hot we can’t sleep properly at night”.
That means even waking her child up for classes can be a challenge she said.
“In the early morning my child’s sleepy eyes make me feel frustrated and helpless - but going to school is a must,” she said.
The heat is also adding to her workload, she said, as her child’s uniform needs to be washed every day when they are sweating so heavily. “Otherwise it is a bad small which is a great problem - but washing the dress is extra effort and pressure,” she said.
Outside Government Jamila Ayeenul Ananda School & College in Dhaka’s Mohammadpur area, children were arriving for school in even smaller and hotter transport - a tiny enclosed blue metal people carrier propelled by one man straining on a bicycle. Built for five students, it carried 10 instead, with brightly coloured bags hung on the back.
“Middle-income families hire this van for the children - but in this hot weather they suffer badly,” said Salam Mia, the operator, as sweating students poured out. “I can’t bear to see them like that, so I keep their bags outside to create a little more space inside.”
Sanowar Hossain, a 14-year-old student, said he used the hot, stuffy transport only because “we don’t have any other option”.
more heat, less school
The increasing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events in Bangladesh - a problem linked to climate change - is having a serious impact on children’s education, said Rana Flowers, a UNICEF representative in Bangladesh.
“Extreme temperatures and other climate hazards don’t only damage schools, they can affect students’ concentration, memory and mental and physical health. Prolonged school closures increase the chance of children – especially adolescent girls – dropping out of school and being married off by families to cope with economic stress,” she said in a news release.
Increasingly lengthy heatwaves are “a new kind of natural disaster for the people. We are not prepared for it at all,” she said, noting education and preparedness initiatives on extreme heat were limited.
Municipal and national leaders in Dhaka said they are planning some actions to try to improve heat awareness and cut risks of overheating for students and others.
After seeking advice from parents, Bangladesh’s education officials, for example, are working to shift school hours during hot periods and improve access to safe, cool water in schools, said Chowdhury Rafiqul Abrar, an advisor to the Ministry of Education.
The ministry is also looking at adding fans in classrooms and making dress codes more flexible, he said.
The Bangladesh Meteorological Department also regularly issues warnings during heatwaves advising people to take precautionary measures and avoid direct exposure to sun during the hottest part of the day - not easy for students leaving school at that time. The health ministry has advised Dhaka’s residents to drink at least 2.5 to 3 litres of water each day and to rest as needed in shaded areas.
Dr. Md. Abid Hossain Mollah, a professor and head of paediatrics at Birdem General Hospital & Ibrahim Medical College in Dhaka, said efforts to keep students and others safe from worsening extreme heat will also need to focus on improving the city’s water access, sometimes known as its “blue” infrastructure.
"We talk about tree planting but not about preserving or increasing water bodies. Unplanned river filling, filling up of ponds and other water reservoirs are also reasons for the increasing heatwaves,” Mollah said in an interview. "Adequate moisture in the air helps reduce heat.”
hotter temperatures, SICKER STUDENTS
Rising temperatures in Bangladesh’s schools are already leading to more illness among pupils, health experts and parents say.
Saheda Begum, a maid, said her daughter, who attends a government high school, had come home recently suffering from a high fever and burns on her skin from heavy swearing and the sun’s heat.
“My girl’s fever was so high I couldn’t even control it with antibiotics. The doctor said it is a common problem created by the hot weather,” she said.
Hot weather is also causing food - including school lunches and the drinks and snacks sold near schools - to spoil more quickly and more often, parents say.
Begum said she sends her daughter a packed lunch each day but in very hot weather “most of the time it gets rotten and the bad smell pushes her to buy street food in front of the school” which is not always sanitary, she said.
Recently, her overheated and thirsty daughter bought a lemon juice drink near her school and afterwards suffered stomach problems, which left her debilitated for a week. The surge in health problems is adding to the family’s financial burden, Begum said.
Such food-related health problems are “an indirect effect of heatwaves,” said Mollah, the paediatric doctor.
He urged parents to send children to school with plenty of boiled and then cooled water, to ensure they don’t become dehydrated in the heat or turn to risky drinks and foods.
“If a child contracts diarrhea in this intense heat, their condition can become very serious,” he noted.
‘DISTRESSING’ RURAL HEAT
Bangladesh’s heat is also affecting many schoolchildren in rural areas.
Benu Begum Bizlee, the acting heat teacher at Rahim Uddin Government Primary School in northern Bangladesh, said children often walk long distances to school, a danger in hot periods, and that extreme heat was curtailing everything from sports activities to children’s attention spans, disrupting teaching and leading to more absenteeism.
As heat threats rise, a rethink of school days is needed, she said. Schools in Bangladesh, for instance, hold mandatory daily assemblies, usually about a half-hour long and often outside. These are becoming dangerous in the heat but cannot be cancelled without permission from authorities, Bizlee said.
Some small one-room schools have ceiling fans, she said, but because the roof and walls of the buildings absorb so much heat during the day “even the fans fail to provide relief. The hot air just keeps circulating.” She called the conditions “extremely distressing”.
As temperatures rise further as a result of rising climate-changing emissions, teachers will need to be trained and equipped to provide emergency care in schools, Bizlee said.
“Preparations and guidelines to deal with heatwaves should be pre-planned,” she urged.