Mayeda Rashid

Growing up in a small village in Bangladesh, Mayeda has had first hand experience with a lack of disaster preparedness as her village frequently dealt with floods. “I have a passion for children, I’ve always wanted to work with them while studying disaster risk reduction,” Mayeda says.

Fifty three children were involved in the first phase of Mayeda’s research, where they were involved in designing an education program through focus group discussions. “The program has been designed by children. They know what they want to learn and how they want to learn,” Mayeda says. “Children want to share their learning with their friends and family members, which is really important because of the large number of children who do not attend school in Bangladesh.” Mayeda has also been working with practitioners from both government and non-government organisations in Bangladesh to better understand what their needs are for effective disaster education.

She piloted her program in her home village in Bangladesh, Tarua. Mayeda has presented her research findings at the CRC’s Research Forum in 2018, as well as a Three Minute Thesis at Research Driving Change – Showcase 2017. She has also authored a chapter on child centred disaster risk reduction in Education in Times of Environmental Crisis: Teaching Children to be Agents of Change, published in 2016