Yoweri Museveni Primary School, where parents think all is free

Nov 19, 2014

Eleven-year-old Akram Ngondowa, a Primary Six pupil of Yoweri Museveni Primary School in Mbale municipality,

By Daniel Edyegu

Eleven-year-old Akram Ngondowa, a Primary Six pupil of Yoweri Museveni Primary School in Mbale municipality, has already encrusted his dream profession on stone. It is a dream built on the desire to serve the community than the prestige the profession carries.

He wants to be a doctor. Despite his tender age, Ngondowa has hazy knowledge of what it takes to achieve his dream. But there is a glitch.

“My dream is to become a doctor. I want to be relevant to my community by treating my people. In our school, the teaching of sciences is taken lightly. We do not have handson learning at all. We rely on chalkboard illustrations and explanations from the teacher,” Ngondowa narrates.

It is a problem that Ngondowa may have to put up with for an unpredictable future, given the prevailing circumstances at the school.

The funding

The science apparatus are some of the items which should have been procured using the capitation grants sent by the Government to schools under the Universal Primary Education (UPE) programme.

On average, the Government spends sh7,000 on each pupil annually under the UPE programme, translating to about sh2,350 per pupil per term. A government-aided primary school started in 2006, Yoweri Museveni Primary School receives about sh2.5m as capitation grant per term; translating into sh7.5m per year. The school currently has 1,249 pupils with 22 teachers.
It should have been receiving about sh8.74m, had it been allocated the money for every pupil.

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Primary Seven pupils of Yoweri Museveni Primary School doing an examination. Photo by Daniel Edyegu

School struggles

Given the high number of pupils, Moses Mutambo, the school’s headteacher, explains that whenever funds are remitted,
the school management committee treads carefully in choosing its priorities to ensure the funds are used optimally. “We go for the basics – instruction materials like chalk, reams of paper for printing tests and examinations; administration and co-curricular activities,” Mutambo explains.

“But there are necessary scholastic materials we never buy. We yearn for science apparatus because it encourages the grounding of learners in sciences,” the headteacher explains.

He also wonders: “Where can we even keep this apparatus – the test tubes and the chemicals? We do not have a laboratory. Whenever we have science experiments to do, we borrow apparatus from the neighbouring Mbale Secondary School and return them thereafter,” Mutambo says.

Because of the high enrolment, pupils are crammed into the available 10 classrooms, a situation the teachers say they have decided to come to terms with. Even the pupils’ choices in this case seem so limited.

“Five of us squeeze on a small desk. We sit uncomfortably. Writing is hard. Whenever some pupils are absent and a desk is free, I relocate there. I keep on shifting to spacious desks unless the class is full, which is rare,” narrates Silver Oidi, a Primary Six pupil, whose class has 143 pupils.

According to the school headteacher, each of the 10 classrooms has space enough to take 30 desks sitting three pupils per desk. This comes to 90 pupils per class. But since there is limited space, they have to squeeze themselves on the available desks.

Amidst all these, Mutambo agrees the grant is a vital tool in pushing forth the country’s vision of having almost all school-going children educated.

He says the fund requires a few changes to sort out anomalies that have bogged the otherwise good intentions of the Government. He says the time of remitting the funds and the amount sent to schools should be the fi rst areas that have to be
revisited.

“We opened the third term at the start of September and it is now November, but the grants for the term have not yet been
remitted. We, at times, get some f the basic requirements like scholastic materials on credit,” explains the headteacher.

He adds: “Since we are not always sure when the funds will be remitted, owners of stationery shops tend to charge a huge interest on such purchases. If, for instance, an item is at sh8,000 on the market, they will charge sh9,000 to sh10,000. But
your hands are tied and you cannot reject the offer, however costly it may be.”

Besides, Mutambo argues that the money must be revised upwards to cater for the increase of commodity prices. From sh7,000 per pupil, Mutambo says raising this to sh10,000 per pupil will slightly cushion the inadequacy.

An extra fee

To keep afl oat, the school charges pupils sh10,000 per term to keep running the school efficiently. But this remedy, too, has its fair share of shortfalls. First, the payment of the fees is not mandatory – a parent chooses whether to pay or not to.

Secondly, when they pay, the debt balance for that particular term is not carried forward to the next term.

“A parent has failed to pay fees for this term, what is the likelihood that he will be able to pay the debt and the new charge for the new term?” the headteacher asks.

"The headteacher, Moses Mutambo, says the school has not received the funds for this term"

 

“For some parents, they may be having a good number of school-going children from Primary One to Seven up to secondary. The moment you carry forth the debt, you just compound the problem,” Mutambo explains. As such, the school always
collects about sh6.2m, as fees from parents to subsidise the funding from the Government.

One of the teachers said many teachers are doing their best to teach in schools under the UPE programme, but in cases where there is another good private school in the neighbourhood, they resort to teaching part-time in other schools.

“At times, it is frustrating to work in a school which is poorly funded. Even when you have a problem, a poorly funded school may not be able to help you because of inadequate resources,” he explained.

Parents’ views

Christopher Ociti, a community elder and chairperson for the school’s Parent and Teacher’s Association (PTA), traces the failure by parents to clear school fees to the school’s origin.

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The administration block of Yoweri Museveni Primary School. Photo by Daniel Edyegu

“Because of the name Yoweri Museveni, many parents think they should not contribute towards the running of the school. They think it was a donation from the President. We have had to explain to most parents the benefits of paying this fee and many
are starting to comply,” Ociti observes. He also adds that the funding from the Government is not enough and needs to be increased if the school is to operate efficiently. However, some of the parents are committed to paying the fees.“We resolved
to pay the fees, to help the school keep running effi ciently. It is wrong for us to depend on the Government to do all things for
us,” Paul Musaazi, one of the parents in the school explains.

With a combination of strategies, the management committee believes the grant will enable them accomplish their goals.

 

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