Makerere is inadequately staffed

Oct 20, 2005

SIR — A lot has been written about Makerere University in the recent past, but to my surprise none of these concerns has ever been given serious attention by the university administration.

SIR — A lot has been written about Makerere University in the recent past, but to my surprise none of these concerns has ever been given serious attention by the university administration.

Although some problems need long-term solutions, I think there are problems that need immediate attention. The most glaring problem is poor staffing at this great institution.

Recently, I was shocked to learn that in one of the departments in the Faculty of Social Sciences, a course unit was abandoned because the lecturer who had been teaching it was planning to go for further studies!

What puzzled me was not the fact that this lecturer was going for further studies but rather why he had been teaching this course if, for all these years, no capable person could be recruited to replace him.

Or could it be the fact that the department, all of a sudden, realised how irrelevant the course had become? In the same department, some students were told not to do a research paper because the lecturers available were not enough to supervise them! Yet under normal circumstances, every student must do research.

Again could it be the fact that all of a sudden the department realised how irrelevant this research paper had become, or did the department have no plan to replace the lecturers who were going on study leave, early enough? Where does that put students whose greatest desire was to do research.

These students have sunk huge sums of money in school fees! What sort of graduates does Makerere finally hope to produce if this trend continues?

If two or even four good days can be spent on graduation, why can’t the administrators at Makerere find better solutions to some of the simplest problems that are ruining this great university? Behind every problem, there is a problem of leadership. For Makerere, this problem is at every level.

History will judge the adminisstrators harshly if they let Makerere go to the dogs.
Makerere was once a great university in the whole of Africa and its present administrators at every level should make an effort to maintain that image.

Name withheld

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