The construction of seed secondary schools has seen more students that cannot afford private schools to study under the free Universal Secondary Education (USE). Indeed, enrolment in most schools has surpassed the planned target due to the impact of Covid-19 on the education sector.
The District Education Officers (DEOs) are now concerned that the quality of education will not be guaranteed with inadequate teachers. At the newly-constructed St Andrew’s Ndwaddemutwe Seed SS in Naggalama, Mukono, the enrolment is currently at 507 with only 16 teachers on the government payroll.
The head teacher of the school, Nathan Kigongo, said whereas the staff ceiling is 31 teachers, they have not received new staff – with less than a month to end the school term.
“In our wisdom, we feared to leave our children to go without lessons and recruited nine temporary part-time staff to help fill the gaps as we patiently keep our fingers crossed for action from the government. However, if the action takes longer than expected, we shall request permission from relevant authorities to engage parents and pay more teachers,” Kigongo said.
In 2019, the Church of Uganda, in an agreement with the district, donated six acres of land on which the school was constructed. They received fully-furnished six classrooms accommodating 60 learners each, the main hall, computer and science laboratories, library, toilets, and six staff houses.
St Andrew’s Ndwaddemutwe is now the 19th government secondary school in Mukono district. The distinct 187 government primary schools, more than 400 private primary schools, and 105 private secondary schools.
The DEO of Mukono, Rashid Kikomeko, said in absence of this only seed school, learners in the Kimenyedde sub-county that could not afford private schools have been trekking about 10 kilometres to the next government secondary school.
“Government is constructing seed schools, this is commendable, but we need sufficient teachers to teach in these wonderful buildings. If a learner walks to school and finds no teacher, do you expect that learner to return to school?” Kikomeko asked.
He added: “The government should also allow districts to recruit more primary teachers because their ceiling is also still low at 1,758 and distributed in 187 schools. On average, these are nine teachers per school and are not enough. Although the minimum number of teachers per school is seven, we have schools with about 2,500 learners.”
In Kayunga, there are 12 and 167 government primary and secondary schools, respectively. At least 48 and 358 are private secondary and primary schools.
The DEO of Kayunga, Alice Doya, said for a decade now, the district has been grappling with inadequate teachers.
“We are looking at inadequate teachers in seed secondary today but at primary level, it is worse. As a DEO, it does not make sense to construct such nice facilities without teachers. The teachers are there and qualified but the wage bill must be increased to recruit more teachers,” Doya said at the opening of Musiitwa Seed SS, the first USE school in Nazigo sub-county.
It is located about 12km from the government-aided St Kalemba SS. Doya said the teacher to student ratio is supposed to be one to 40, but for Musiitwa Seed SS with an enrolment of 466 learners to date has only 21 teachers on the government payroll while 11 staff are paid by the Parents and Teachers Association.
To further improve service delivery in seed schools, she urged the government to construct more staff houses and dormitories for at least female students that walk long distances to schools across the country.
MINISTRY SPEAKS
While commissioning St Andrew’s Ndwaddemutwe Seed SS, the state minister for Higher Education, Dr John Chrysostom Muyingo, acknowledged that the ministry has observed the low staffing levels in the new schools and lack of critical amenities such as electricity and water mostly in hard-to-reach areas.
“This is a start. We may not be in a position to put in everything like teachers at full capacity but the recruitment process has not closed. The Education Service Commission will soon advertise and fill the gaps. I, therefore, request that the ministry of Finance which coordinates the implementation of the programme to prioritize the provision of the critical services to the schools,” Muyingo said.
Under the UgIFT programme, at least 259 secondary schools will be constructed in sub-counties without seed schools. The construction is being handled in three phases; 117 in phase one, 115 in phase two, and 27 schools in the third phase.
He said some sub-counties, divisions, and town councils will not be covered by the end of the programme due to resource constraints to accommodate the needs of all including the newly-created administrative units.
“In that regard, the ministry will undertake a mapping exercise to establish the gap of the administrative units which do not have a government secondary School per sub-county and make appropriate plans towards the achievement of the objective of the government,” Muyingo said while urging school administrators to maintain the new facilities.
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