EACH monsoon, Dhaka turns into a city fighting against water. Even moderate rain results in urban flooding that hinders everyday life and mobility because of encroached streams and weak drainage systems. The vulnerable populations are most impacted by this long-running disaster, particularly school girls in poor urban neighbourhoods. They consider waterlogging to be more than an infrastructural problem; it is a barrier to education that affects attendance, increases the likelihood of dropout, and reinforces cycles of gender disparity and poverty.
According to recent UNICEF data, in 2024 alone, climate-related incidents delayed the education of almost 33 million school–age children in Bangladesh. Particularly in urban slums where roads vanish under standing water, girls were disproportionately impacted. Due to impassable roads, harassment fears, or a lack of basic hygiene during floods, girls in these neighbourhoods frequently miss school for days or weeks at a time. Long-term educational impairments are a result of these missing days.
Poor infrastructure also restricts access to education. Schools are rarely located close to Dhaka’s informal settlements, and those that are frequently substandard and susceptible to floods. According to a 2024 study on slum conditions, children-particularly girls-must walk great distances on foot, via hazardous and flooded roads, in order to get to school. In order to prevent mishaps, families usually choose to keep girls at home during the monsoon season, which contributes to the gender gap in school attendance.
Additionally, flooding has an indirect effect on schooling through its effects on households. Families deal with damaged homes, contaminated drinking water and inadequate sanitation during urban water logging. Because public restrooms are inaccessible during floods, girls may choose to stay at home in order to securely manage their menstrual hygiene.
These difficulties have further consequences. Families may completely deprioritise girl’s education when they experience frequent disruptions to their education, especially when they live in poverty. According to a 2023 national study, secondary school attendance has decreased by over a million students since 2019, with the majority of dropouts occurring in low-income urban and rural areas. This decrease is exacerbated by waterlogging-related absenteeism, which also raises the risk of early marriage or involvement in informal labour, particularly for teenage girls.
The issue is being made worse by migration trends. Tens of thousands of rural families have been forced into Dhaka’s informal settlements annually due to climate-related displacement. These places are more vulnerable to flooding and lack essential urban services. The infrastructure for education has not kept pace with the growth of these settlements. Many newly arrived children, particularly girls, are completely excluded from formal education in the absence of safe schools or reliable transportation choices.
Most low-income urban girls cannot afford digital education, which was originally promoted as a remedy amid school closures. A 2024 UNICEF study found that less than 20 per cent of teenage girls living in informal settlements had reliable electricity or internet-enabled devices during floods. Digital learning has essentially increased educational inequality by enabling middle-and upper-class students to finish their education while underprivileged girls continue to lag behind.
Although the government has implemented certain measures, such as setting up response teams and deploying emergency water pumps, these are insufficient and reactive. Uncollected wastage continues to choke drainage systems, and floodplain laws are frequently disregarded in new building. School buildings in flood-prone locations still lack the structural stability and safety elements needed to withstand severe weather conditions.
Furthermore, gender-sensitive planning is not significantly incorporated into the majority of Dhaka’s urban development policies. When choosing a school location or organizing transportation, girl’s safety and mobility-particularly during monsoon seasons-are rarely taken into account. Most families opt to keep their daughters home when educational access is conditioned upon perilous or waterlogged routes. Interventions continue to be shallow and ineffective without institutional acknowledgment of these barriers.
There needs to be a holistic approach by the national and local governments of Dhaka to address these problems. This includes natural drainage systems, ie, canals and wetlands, being a top priority for restoration and preservation, and strictly enforcing the law against illegal encroachments. Constructing climate-resilient schools with elevated classrooms, functional toilets, and safe access paths in flood-prone zones needs to be the top priority of infrastructure development. To maintain learning continuity during times of heavy rainfall, alternative learning arrangements must also be created. These could be mobile learning facilities, community schools, or even planned instruction through SMS and radio for girls with no digital access. Conditional cash transfers or emergency scholarships that help families keep girls in school rather than compelling them into early marriage or the labour force are also vital.
Also, there should be community engagement. There is a need to support school management committees and local women’s organisations to enable them to monitor school safety, guide girls through flood-risk areas and influence planning decisions. Engaging women and girls in developing and managing policies on education and climate adaptation will ensure that solutions reflect real situations and not idealised circumstances. Last but not the least, plans for urban climate adaptation must specifically address educational equality. Even the most well-meaning flood management plans will fail to help those who need it most if this is not done. The emergence of a resilient city entails making certain that its daughters attend school in safety, learn with honour and come home inspired.
Dhaka cannot afford to let its daughters’ ambitions be dashed by another monsoon season.
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Shajeda Akter Moni, an army major, is deputy director at the Research Centre, Bangladesh University of Professionals.