Repetition hurts UPE
Jan 24, 2004
Minister Namirembe Bitamazire, in charge of primary education is irked by head teachers who make weak pupils under the UPE programme repeat classes
By Josephine Maseruka
Minister Namirembe Bitamazire, in charge of primary education is irked by head teachers who make weak pupils under the UPE programme repeat classes.
She said that this bad habit is partly to blame for only 460,000 UPE candidates to have sat for the Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) in 2003 instead of the targeted one million.
Last year was the maiden PLE year since the launching of the Universal Primary Education programme in the country.
Bitamazire said that the drop in the expected UPE candidates last year was because over 100,000 pupils who would have sat for the PLE were not registered by head teachers.
“Headteachers claimed that the unregistered pupils were too weak to pass the PLE. Yet headteachers wanted to give an impression that they had thoroughly played their part,†she said.
The minister regretted that in Mbale one school did not register 76 pupils for the PLE.
Another reason she raised for the drop in the targeted candidates was that in 1997at the launch of the UPE there was a lot of excitement from the public and under age children of up to 20 years were registered.
When the excitement died pupils started dropping out of school for various reasons and some of those who remained were made to repeat classes.
“Many parents took to school children of three and four years who were too young to cope with the older pupils so they were made to repeat classes to catch up with class work,†she clarified.
Bitamazire warned headteachers against making pupils repeat classes. She instead encouraged them to help the weak pupils using remedial work outside classroom time.
“Is there any parent who would want a child to repeat? And we should address issues that make pupils weak like teachers dodging classes, parents not giving their children books and lunch among others,†she said.
Bitamazire appealed to all stakeholders in the UPE to monitor kids and bring to the attention of relevant officials right from the grassroots to national level the weaknesses identified in the programme for immediate action.
The minister assured Ugandans that UPE was a very big success and appealed to everyone to support it.
Minister Namirembe Bitamazire, in charge of primary education is irked by head teachers who make weak pupils under the UPE programme repeat classes.
She said that this bad habit is partly to blame for only 460,000 UPE candidates to have sat for the Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) in 2003 instead of the targeted one million.
Last year was the maiden PLE year since the launching of the Universal Primary Education programme in the country.
Bitamazire said that the drop in the expected UPE candidates last year was because over 100,000 pupils who would have sat for the PLE were not registered by head teachers.
“Headteachers claimed that the unregistered pupils were too weak to pass the PLE. Yet headteachers wanted to give an impression that they had thoroughly played their part,†she said.
The minister regretted that in Mbale one school did not register 76 pupils for the PLE.
Another reason she raised for the drop in the targeted candidates was that in 1997at the launch of the UPE there was a lot of excitement from the public and under age children of up to 20 years were registered.
When the excitement died pupils started dropping out of school for various reasons and some of those who remained were made to repeat classes.
“Many parents took to school children of three and four years who were too young to cope with the older pupils so they were made to repeat classes to catch up with class work,†she clarified.
Bitamazire warned headteachers against making pupils repeat classes. She instead encouraged them to help the weak pupils using remedial work outside classroom time.
“Is there any parent who would want a child to repeat? And we should address issues that make pupils weak like teachers dodging classes, parents not giving their children books and lunch among others,†she said.
Bitamazire appealed to all stakeholders in the UPE to monitor kids and bring to the attention of relevant officials right from the grassroots to national level the weaknesses identified in the programme for immediate action.
The minister assured Ugandans that UPE was a very big success and appealed to everyone to support it.