Education Minister ANM Ehsanul Hoque Milon on Monday said Bangladesh must first bring back its high-performing students from foreign universities through "reverse brain drain" if it wants to establish itself as an education hub.

"We have no shortage of talented teachers and students in our country. Our students are doing very well in research and results at universities abroad. We must bring them back through reverse brain drain and put that talent to use," Milon said while speaking as chief guest at the "QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) Bangladesh Forum 2026" at a hotel in Dhaka.

The conference, themed "Benchmark Bangladesh: Building World-Class Universities Through Global Standards," was attended by representatives from more than 90 universities across Bangladesh.

The minister said there is no alternative to technical and vocational education and training (TVET) if the country's huge population is to be turned into a productive workforce, and called for greater emphasis on TVET at the university level alongside wider use of artificial intelligence (AI) in higher education.

He also stressed the need for universities to focus more on research in order to improve Bangladesh's position in QS rankings, and underlined the importance of cross-border education. "We want to build Bangladesh as an education hub. We have that capacity."

Talking to reporters after the event, the minister said an unusually large number of applications have been submitted for re-evaluation of SSC answer scripts this year, with more than 1.2 million applications received so far, a volume he described as making the re-evaluation process extremely challenging, since it appears almost all students want their scripts reassessed.

"We are planning to formulate a new policy on script re-evaluation so that the scope of which scripts can be re-evaluated is clearly defined," he said.

He further said the government has taken steps to simplify visa policy in order to attract foreign investment and increase opportunities for foreign students to study in Bangladesh, which will make it easier for foreign students to obtain Bangladeshi visas.