Makerere University has launched electronic academic transcripts and certificates, allowing graduates to access their credentials online while enabling employers and other authorised parties to verify them digitally, in a move aimed at modernising academic service delivery.
The initiative is part of the university’s broader digital transformation strategy, which also includes expanded online learning and the rollout of competency-based education beginning with the 2026/2027 academic year.
Academic registrar Prof Mukadasi Buyinza said the e-transcripts and e-certificates will spare graduates the inconvenience of repeatedly returning to the university to obtain certified academic documents.
“The new e-transcripts and certificates will enable graduates to access their academic documents electronically while allowing employers and other third parties to verify their authenticity online with the graduate’s permission,” Buyinza said.
He said the initiative will enhance the security, credibility and accessibility of Makerere’s academic records while streamlining verification services for graduates, employers and institutions.
Buyinza also revealed that the university has fully institutionalised blended learning, combining face-to-face and online instruction across its academic programmes.
He said Makerere is developing fully online degree programmes that will enable students from anywhere in the world to study remotely and earn qualifications from the university.
According to Buyinza, the digital reforms reflect Makerere’s commitment to adopting more efficient methods of delivering education while widening access to higher learning.
He added that beginning with the 2026/2027 academic year, the university will implement revised curricula in line with the government’s directive to shift from theory-based instruction to Competency-Based Education and Training (CBET).
The curriculum review is intended to equip graduates with practical, industry-relevant skills that improve employability and respond more effectively to labour market demands.
Meanwhile, vice chancellor Prof Barnabas Nawangwe dismissed claims that Makerere is facing a shortage of lecturers, saying the institution remains among the best-staffed universities on the continent.
Speaking during an update on the implementation of the university’s 2025–2030 Strategic Plan, Nawangwe said Makerere currently has about 32,000 enrolled students and approximately 1,400 teaching staff, including 1,100 lecturers with doctoral qualifications.
According to Nawangwe, this gives the university a lecturer-to-student ratio of 1:21, well above the international benchmark of one lecturer for every 35 students.
He said the high number of PhD holders has strengthened Makerere’s research capacity, enabling both staff and students to perform competitively in international research and academic forums.
Nawangwe also dismissed allegations that the university has frozen recruitment and promotions.
“The university continues to make significant strides in building a robust and motivated workforce through strategic recruitment, appointments and promotions,” he said.
He noted that over the past year, the University’s Appointments Board approved several appointments to academic leadership positions, including deans and heads of departments, while recruiting academic, administrative and support staff to fill critical vacancies.
Although retirements and natural staff attrition continue to create vacancies, Nawangwe said the university remains committed to replacing departing staff and attracting top talent as part of implementing its strategic plan.
This is a very good initiative. You deserve an applause. E-transcripts is a better way to have a good record keeping and the safety of such documents both to the university and the students
Transformed from a technical school in 1922 to an institution of higher learning in 1938 was according to Governor Sir Philip Mitchell supposed to “produce an aristocracy of culture which by nature must be very small”
with only 29 first year students and 25 finalists 5of whom were Uganda’s between 1958-1959 but it’s grown into a “mega multiversity” with a total enrollment of approx. 35000 students. That’s progress indeed. Besides, Mak is still one of the leading institutions in Africa. It still has strong links with the others and the rest of the world.
Forgot the recent rankings Mak’s being well known world wide compared to others and its reputation of being a leading institution in Africa for many decades places it at the top of the notch in many aspects of higher education.
It seems the changes in the academic heartland of the western world which spread worldwide and were like the mass movement of a landslide which those living in its path sometimes ignore at their, didn’t spare it! Never mind though, that in the past Mak had been perceived as a centre of of dissent, creating mistrust between the institution of Government and the University community.
This needed not have been so because the two institutions ought to have looked at each other as partners in development. They ought to have respected each other because Mak is, so to speak, the “microcosm” of Uganda’s political ecosystems.It may be possible that failure of the Government to consult the experts at Mak when National or Regional Development Plans were being formulated caused the problem.
Historically the University is has been part and parcel of that development, isn’t it? In conclusion, I think Makerere, like other institutions of higher education should be brought into the broad picture of National Policy formulation at the expertise and mobilization levels. It can assist Govt. in sensitizing the community on the relevance of Govt. policies.
When I undertook a study on Bureaucracy and the management of the challenges facing Makerere University in 2005, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of MA in Education Management, I found a high incidence of bureaucratic inefficiency in records management in almost every faculty and department.
Each time I went to the Postgrad records Office there was someone complaining about a lost file or delay in processing transcripts for successfully completed courses or incomplete records about payment of University dues and tuition fees. The problem was attributed to Bureaucracy in the negative sense of “Red Tape”.
The long queues between the Senate Building and the faculty of Social Sciences had become a real demotivator for anyone looking for transcripts or some such other document. An aging notice on on the Notice Board specified a whopping 5 steps steps as the procedures to be undertaken: Print out to be obtained from level 6 Rm 6.27; Financial statement obtainable from Faculty Accounts Office; Registration slipwhich involved not less than 5 steps; Receipt/Bank slip showing ID payment; and Green paper ID! Bureaucracy may have worked well as Marx Weber envisioned in his ideal type model when Makerere was still a small institution, designed to to serve colonial objectives. In this age of technological changes it has become dysfunctional.
The observed bureaucratic procedures mentioned above were generalizable or replicated in all other processes e.g. getting a physical transcript. One day I found a graduand from Kenya who had returned for the sole purpose of getting her transcript!
Digitizing all these procedures in the registration and financial processes has greatly reduced the problem of over-bureacratization of administrative processes at the University and I have no hesitation in commending the Administration for complementing the computerized FINIS and ARIS systems with digital certificates and transcripts which will be very helpful for those who graduate, travel abroad and need them to look for jobs abroad.
Combined with a new strategic plan, the University will be able to increase its efficiency in order to meet the evergrowing demand for enrollment. I’m elated by my alma mater’s capacity to keep pace with developments in the western heartland of international higher education standards and best practices domain.
“She” might as well consider shifting towards adopting the corporate model which has been found to be more efficient than the bureaucratic so-called ideal type which is too ritualistic thereby causing the kind of frustrations that loop into corruption. Once again congratulations.
This is a very good step for those who are always busy with work and those from very far, it’s a good initiative Thank you makerere university
It’s a very good initiative to most of us who are always struggling with money and from long distances
Very good initiative, and in anyway round, am interested