FreeFufu.com

When the Universal Primary  Education (UPE) program began in 1997, some people thought that it would fail. However now we are being told that primary school enrolment has since risen from the 2.5 million to almot 9 million children.  The Ministry of Education  (MoE)is also saying that, the girl child, the children with disabilities as well as those from gegraphically and educationally disadvantaged area of the country are having the priviledge to study under UPE. More classrooms have been built, textbooks and desks and toilets have been put up and the enrolment of the girl-child  under UPE has also gone up from about 3.2 million to almost 4.2 million by this year in a rough estimate.

Inspite of all that and despite the recent results of the PLE/UNEB Exam Results showing that there is an improved perfomance at all grades and that the failure rate has declined alot,  IT IS STILL A SHAME THAT MANY PRIMARY SCHOOL PUPILS HAVE NOT YET ACQUIRED THE BASIC LITERARY AND NUMERACY SKILLS. many of the primary school kids especially in the rural areas can not even write correctly their names let alone to do the reading of a text or a passage that may be written either in their native language or even in english. Even the Minister of Education was quoted as saying that she had been told that A PUPIL IN P.4 DOES NOT KNOW HOW TO READ AND WRITE --- and she asked herself - BY P.4 YOU DO NOT KNOW HOW TO WRITE? a good number of pupils are also dropping out of school by P4,5,6, and P7 may be its because of hunger, absenteism or the schools system lacks relevance to their life and that of society. Why do they leave school when all is free education especially at UPE schools?

And then it has been  passed by the (MoE) that effective this term all primary schools in Uganda will adopt the teaching of vernacular languages in the lower classes of primary scools say P1 - P3/4. The MoE claims that  primary teachers havebeen trained to teach in local languages. I wonder if this will help since there is even the proposal TO INTRODUCE UNEB PROMOTIONAL EXAMS AT P4, that if one does not pas them he will not be able to go to P5 and in future that may be a requirement for sitting for the PLE, that without the UNEB Exam slip of National Exams done at the end of P4 you may not sit for the PLE P7 Exams. It was hopped that this would force the kids in primary schools to read more and be able to get ready for better perfomance by PLE.

Personally i think that the education system in Ugandas primary schools needs to be improved a lot so as to reduce the gap between rural and town or city schools performance. And the use of English language  must be stressed as well at all levels. For its a shame that pupils are finishing P7 and have the so called good PLE Exam results but when they come into class of S1 the truth of the matter is that a good number have little command of English language and again they cannot even write correctly their names. ONE THEN WONDERS -- did they pass or was it part of the political campain to have many finish PLE and thus give credit to Govt that the PLE graduates have passed well and must go to Siniya or USE when actually their passing is not all that genuine........... IS NOW THE BIG QUESTION. So how to improve  ugandas primary school education.

 http://www.ugpulse.com/articles/daily/print.asp?ID=432       

http://www.newvision.co.ug/PA/9/35/547126

http://www.ugpulse.com/articles/daily/print.asp?ID=218

Tiica - Politics is the overiding factor to these programmes which are rife in the country with slogans drummed up to fit in with the flava of the day.  If any ground research is done, it's most often syphoned off by top guys from the ruling elite who have little or no understanding of its implementation other than the fact that it will earn them higher pay and post.  Therefore it goes to follow that any true factual groundwork that needs addressing is never done.  What we get are polished jargons and figures to suit the external world bodies who sponsor such educational programmes.

Without breaking down these educational programmes to local accountable and regulatory bodies - it becomes a feeding frenzy for those in elite posts of the government to carry on as normal in syphoning off money that ought to be used to see through these projects. 

Secondaly by opening up all these schools for all to study, the welfare of those teaching might probably never been looked at. It may've been a case of teachers being commanded to expect and accept a rise in class numbers whom they had to teach without questioning.  Now you try and teach a class of 50 or more kids who sometimes may've never even been to any kind of regulated education in their first years of life and tell me how you fare.  Yet you'd need to give all of them the same attention.

BTW what is the criteria for all these entrants to primary school anyway and who overseas the selection?  Do these figures get to be monitored and recorded so as to get a look in at local levels before planning for local education needs are done or is it all the same for national levels.  Without looking at each area in a cell format of what local needs there are, it becomes sphagetti junction at national level hence kids coming out without the skills required to suit the environment.

You raise a point on kids' inability to speak English, but are they fluent in spoken or written local dialects? Whereas for global communication, English is some way vital, we shouldn't neglect local dialects - the two should be done in conjuction with parents encouraged to speak to their kids in their local dialects and the school facilitating foreign languages where deemed necessary.  Irrespective of what people say - children are able to speak & write in more than one language - fluently.