Makerere students pay sh5m per year
Jul 25, 2009
Private students admitted to Makerere University need at least sh5m for upkeep per year. The university released a list of 8,525 students admitted for private courses for the year 2009/2010 on Wednesday. Parents, guardians and self-sponsored students are
By Lydia Namubiru and Conan Businge
Private students admitted to Makerere University need at least sh5m for upkeep per year. The university released a list of 8,525 students admitted for private courses for the year 2009/2010 on Wednesday. Parents, guardians and self-sponsored students are now looking for money to cater for the university requirements.
Saturday Vision analysis of the cost of living at Makerere University and the surrounding hostels, shows that a student pursuing the cheapest course, in an average hostel and with fair feeding, will still need at least sh2.5m a semester of four months.
That means sh5m per year to cover basic expenses like registration, tuition, scholastic material, accommodation, functional fees, food and upkeep.
Private students tuition fees range from sh960,000 for technical science courses to 450,000 for courses in the faculty of arts. However other living expenses may even triple one’s tuition fees.
In addition, students need money to pay for other expenses like photocopying lecturer’s notes or handouts, printing courseworks, scholastic material, personal effects and upkeep.
Hostel accommodation rates range from sh200,000 to sh1.4m a semester per student. While the rates for hostel accommodation vary widely, one would be hard pressed to find a hostel that charges less than 200,000 a semester. Even for sh200,000 a student will most likely to live in a small room with three others and share toilet and bathroom facilities with all other residents in the hostel.
Such a hostel offers no other amenities except accommodation, power and water. These types of hostels are among the earliest established living quarters for Makerere University students and, as a result, a number of them enjoy recognition as hostels affiliated to the university.
For more comfort, a student would have to live in one of the more recently built hostels in Kikoni and Katanga. These hostels are typically big buildings housing hundreds of students. They offer self contained rooms, DSTV, reading rooms, security and transport to and from campus at different times of the day. The medium class hostels with fees between sh350,000 to sh800,000 include Baskon, Bbira, Grand Hostel, Garden Courts, Dream World, and Waveney. Others are Sir Pinto Giant Hostel, Prince, and Off-shore. But, save for Giant Hostel in Wandegeya suburbs, the rest are located on the dusty side of the campus in Kikoni.
Top class hostels are those in and around Katanga such as Akamwesi, Braeto and Kiwamirembe hostels. In these, a single room goes for nearly sh1m a semester. In these hostels, a resident is entitled to transport to and fro campus, satellite television in a well furnished common room, a stand by generator, reading rooms and a modern kitchen.
Food is another cost that fluctuates depending on a student’s preference, extravagance and innovation. While some students brave the unhygienic conditions in dingy joints called kikumi-kikumi to enjoy a meal of about sh800, restaurants attached to posh hostels like Akamwesi serve food for as much as sh7,000. There are also decent restaurants where a plate of food is at sh2,000 - sh2,500.
At the final count, the student will have spent more that sh2.5m as the life of Bertha Mbabazi who is pursing an arts degree illustrates. At sh450,000, her tuition fees are among the lowest in the university. Dreamland hostel, where she sleeps, is relatively comfortable and, for the room she shares with two others, she pays sh350,000. She almost always buys her food from a restaurant and that costs her sh5,000 a day translating into a total expenditure of sh595,000 for one semester. “I do literature so we have quite a lot to photocopy,†she states. On these photocopying jobs, she estimates that she spends about sh5,000 a week making it sh85,000 a semester. Her basic expenses alone therefore come to sh1,485,000 a semester. That is without personal effects, pocket money and other services like health and leisure.
To cut costs, some students choose to cook their own food as John Makumi, a Kenyan does. Even then, his parents furnish him with about sh300,000 every semester to meet the cost of food stuffs and other living expenses. In addition they pay for his sh350,000 a semester hostel room.
Commuting from home is another option. William Wagwa who commutes from his parent’s home in Ntinda says he spends about sh1,700 a day or sh144,500 a semester on his transport to the university. He however does not spend on meals and accommodation but as he says, “there are other things you spend on like photocopying, buying textbooks and the like. They are many and the money you spend is a lot by the way,†Wagwa says.
Being a first semester, the parents of the 8,525 admitted students will also have to spend additionally on functional fees that the university requires. They include development, technology, registration with one’s hall of residence, library, research, identity card, registration with one’s faculty, guild and academic gown fees respectively. “Mine totalled up to about sh450,000,†Wagwa who is completing his first year, remembers.
Additional reporting by Jacobs Odongo.
Private students admitted to Makerere University need at least sh5m for upkeep per year. The university released a list of 8,525 students admitted for private courses for the year 2009/2010 on Wednesday. Parents, guardians and self-sponsored students are now looking for money to cater for the university requirements.
Saturday Vision analysis of the cost of living at Makerere University and the surrounding hostels, shows that a student pursuing the cheapest course, in an average hostel and with fair feeding, will still need at least sh2.5m a semester of four months.
That means sh5m per year to cover basic expenses like registration, tuition, scholastic material, accommodation, functional fees, food and upkeep.
Private students tuition fees range from sh960,000 for technical science courses to 450,000 for courses in the faculty of arts. However other living expenses may even triple one’s tuition fees.
In addition, students need money to pay for other expenses like photocopying lecturer’s notes or handouts, printing courseworks, scholastic material, personal effects and upkeep.
Hostel accommodation rates range from sh200,000 to sh1.4m a semester per student. While the rates for hostel accommodation vary widely, one would be hard pressed to find a hostel that charges less than 200,000 a semester. Even for sh200,000 a student will most likely to live in a small room with three others and share toilet and bathroom facilities with all other residents in the hostel.
Such a hostel offers no other amenities except accommodation, power and water. These types of hostels are among the earliest established living quarters for Makerere University students and, as a result, a number of them enjoy recognition as hostels affiliated to the university.
For more comfort, a student would have to live in one of the more recently built hostels in Kikoni and Katanga. These hostels are typically big buildings housing hundreds of students. They offer self contained rooms, DSTV, reading rooms, security and transport to and from campus at different times of the day. The medium class hostels with fees between sh350,000 to sh800,000 include Baskon, Bbira, Grand Hostel, Garden Courts, Dream World, and Waveney. Others are Sir Pinto Giant Hostel, Prince, and Off-shore. But, save for Giant Hostel in Wandegeya suburbs, the rest are located on the dusty side of the campus in Kikoni.
Top class hostels are those in and around Katanga such as Akamwesi, Braeto and Kiwamirembe hostels. In these, a single room goes for nearly sh1m a semester. In these hostels, a resident is entitled to transport to and fro campus, satellite television in a well furnished common room, a stand by generator, reading rooms and a modern kitchen.
Food is another cost that fluctuates depending on a student’s preference, extravagance and innovation. While some students brave the unhygienic conditions in dingy joints called kikumi-kikumi to enjoy a meal of about sh800, restaurants attached to posh hostels like Akamwesi serve food for as much as sh7,000. There are also decent restaurants where a plate of food is at sh2,000 - sh2,500.
At the final count, the student will have spent more that sh2.5m as the life of Bertha Mbabazi who is pursing an arts degree illustrates. At sh450,000, her tuition fees are among the lowest in the university. Dreamland hostel, where she sleeps, is relatively comfortable and, for the room she shares with two others, she pays sh350,000. She almost always buys her food from a restaurant and that costs her sh5,000 a day translating into a total expenditure of sh595,000 for one semester. “I do literature so we have quite a lot to photocopy,†she states. On these photocopying jobs, she estimates that she spends about sh5,000 a week making it sh85,000 a semester. Her basic expenses alone therefore come to sh1,485,000 a semester. That is without personal effects, pocket money and other services like health and leisure.
To cut costs, some students choose to cook their own food as John Makumi, a Kenyan does. Even then, his parents furnish him with about sh300,000 every semester to meet the cost of food stuffs and other living expenses. In addition they pay for his sh350,000 a semester hostel room.
Commuting from home is another option. William Wagwa who commutes from his parent’s home in Ntinda says he spends about sh1,700 a day or sh144,500 a semester on his transport to the university. He however does not spend on meals and accommodation but as he says, “there are other things you spend on like photocopying, buying textbooks and the like. They are many and the money you spend is a lot by the way,†Wagwa says.
Being a first semester, the parents of the 8,525 admitted students will also have to spend additionally on functional fees that the university requires. They include development, technology, registration with one’s hall of residence, library, research, identity card, registration with one’s faculty, guild and academic gown fees respectively. “Mine totalled up to about sh450,000,†Wagwa who is completing his first year, remembers.
Additional reporting by Jacobs Odongo.