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The opposition shadow cabinet has asked the government to implement school feeding in all government schools to improve the quality of education for learners.

Presenting an alternative budget to the Education Committee of Parliament chaired by Twesigye Ntamuhiira, the shadow minister for education and Kalungu MP Joseph Ssewungu said the lack of sustainable school feeding and nutrition for pupils, teachers, and school workers is a major factor affecting the desired education outcomes in Uganda.

“Feeding at school is an essential and integral component of a child-friendly school's environment, cognitive brain development, and excellence. On the other hand, not feeding a child is a violation of the children’s rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and other international child rights treaties,” Ssewungu said.

The Education Pre-Primary, Primary, and Post-Primary Act of 2008 gives the responsibility of feeding the children to the parents and guardians. Families, especially in rural areas and poor urban centres, fail to provide basic family needs, including food.

He told the committee that the school feeding and nutrition intervention programme tasks the parents and guardians to contribute beans, maize, and other foodstuffs in cash or in kind to feed their children at school, as well as the teachers and support staff and orphans and vulnerable children. This has not taken place since the introduction of universal primary education (UPE).

He asked the government to pay more attention to rural schools to enable children to enrol and stay in school so that high school retention rates would be realised.

“A school feeding and nutrition policy would be developed to that effect. A well-fed learner, without a doubt, stands a better chance of staying in school than one who learns on an empty stomach. This will enable the country to have healthy learners and high retention in schools,” he said.

Looking at the recent 2023 Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB) Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) results, Ssewungu said 749,254 candidates from 15,859 centres sat exams, and of these, 501,602 from 11,365 centres were UPE centres, and 247,652 of the non-UPE, 81,864 got first grade, 334,711 passed in second grade, 146,142in third grade, and 74,875 failed.

He explained that there were 88,269 who were graded in division U, and 14,736 never sat.

“The alternative budgets highly consider continuity for learners who have failed the UNEB exams and cannot be taken into any secondary school. These can be absorbed under the Directorate of Industry Training (DIT) for other training like in agriculture, carpentry, and tailoring, among others, to address the issue of a high number of dropouts and allow learners to proceed on their journey in education,” he said.

On national examination reforms, Ssewungu said primary seven, senior four, and senior six require immediate reform to support better outcomes.

“UNEB sets examinations that lead to misleading outcomes for learners, and the purpose of teaching and learning in schools should not be achieving top grades but various competencies,” he said.

 “Learners are pushed to cram, pass, and ultimately forget everything they learned after passing their exams,” he claims.

Geoffrey Macho, the Busia Municipality MP, expressed dismay over the discrimination among science and art teachers.

“In the financial year 2022-2023, science teachers started earning sh4m, while diploma holders were earning sh3m, leaving arts teachers with a meagre salary they have been earning. This has evidently brought about the division in the teacher’s fraternity, being detrimental to our learners,” he said.

Committee members asked the government to increase funding for public universities to enable them to carry out research.

They agreed with Ssewungu on the school feeding and asked the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development to look at the priorities of the education sector and avail funds.