Syllabus must be relevant to needs

Oct 07, 2004

The Government has come out with emphasis on teaching sciences and soon sciences will be compulsory in our secondary schools, regardless of the ownership or capacity of Uganda’s schools.

Abraham Ahabwe

The Government has come out with emphasis on teaching sciences and soon sciences will be compulsory in our secondary schools, regardless of the ownership or capacity of Uganda’s schools.

These subjects include biology, chemistry, and physics, maths, agriculture. We are trying to produce more doctors, engineers, pharmacists, and electricians, in the hope that they will increase the discoveries of how best to exploit Uganda’s natural resources.

From a deeply entrenched theoretical education which dates as far back as the colonial times when all that was needed was white collar labour, Uganda is heading for a science-based society which president Museveni hopes will thrust the into the coveted industrialisation which upholds the developed world.

However, there are areas in this country whose necessity can’t be judged against the dichotomy of sciences or arts.

An average Ugandan will perhaps not go beyond senior six. This means that by that stage he or she should have been educated into being a responsible citizen with respect to these areas.

Students should be taught primary healthcare. This is a pillar in PEAP. Unless the students grasp its necessity while they are still modelling their values at secondary school stage, there may not be any other appropriate period later in life.

This, and not merely teaching Biology will curb public health disasters and create a health- sensitive population aware about personal hygiene.

Students should also be taught to conserve and protect the environment. Our wetlands are being threatened, rubbish heaps adorn our towns, soil erosion, deforestation, air pollution, the dangers are many. We even live in very poorly planned towns and cities yet issues of land use and planning don’t surface in the education available for many.

The students are just taught about British Columbia and the Canadian Prairies while the environmental issues under their very noses go unattended to. Illiterate and semi-literate people are dragged to court charged with civil and criminal offences which they neither know nor understand. They are ignorant about their very rights yet fully aware of the history of Oyo Kingdom, a thousand miles away!

They need to be taught basic legal procedures, human rights and the worth of constitutionalism. Only then can the civil society be of dependable capacity to press for reforms, where necessary. Students also need to be taught essentials of accountability and book-keeping.

If they turn out to be farmers after senior six which is likely given Ugandans’ dependency on agriculture, they will be able to progressively monitor the growth of their farms and through correct evaluation make appropriate choices.

If they become local council leaders, they will be in a position to give proper accountability of the funds they receive.

Governance has been decentralised. A lot of powers and responsibilities have been devolved to the lower levels of leadership.

How many of our local people or even the elite understand this? The country’s social services are availed through decentralisation, though many are ignorant about how it works.

If students are taught about the system, they will be able to hold their leaders accountable for the money or resources that are received on their behalf and this will reduce corruption. An educational system that denies the majority appreciation of their political system is deficient.

Students should also be taught basic commerce and international trade if they are to engage in Museveni’s dictum of ‘trade not aid’ campaign.

These business management skills will help small sector growth and increase household incomes and at the end of the day contexualising the curriculum and not mere emphasis on science studies is what is more vital and relevant.

The writer is a freelance
journalist

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