'Stop keeping children in gardens, you will face the law'

EDUCATION                      

The district education officer Omoro, Rev. Vincent Ocen Ochieng, has warned parents who keep their children in gardens instead of letting them go to schools that the law will deal with them.

He said it is a tradition in Northern Uganda whenever the rains seasons start, pupils start absenting themselves from school because they have to go and work in the gardens, noting that this is partly why most schools perform poorly.

"I am sounding a warning to all the parents that it is criminal to keep the children as labourers instead of letting them go to school," Ocheing said.

The DEO who was speaking to Vision Group's features editor John Eremu who had paid a courtesy call to him at Omoro district headquarters said that they have tried to sensitize the parents but many still keep children in gardens.

In his speech, Eremu introduced the idea of schools using newspapers to teach noting that this has worked wonders elsewhere. He noted that already Vision Group has started distributing newspapers to selected schools adding that it was mandatory to inform the district leadership about this initiative.

In his response, the DEO said this is a good innovation that it could help improve the performance especially in Universal Primary Education (UPE) schools that are facing a challenge of lack of teaching materials.

He promised to follow up all schools that are getting newspapers to ensure that they are using them for their purpose.

In Omoro, Vision Group in partnership with Save the Children supply free copies of the newspapers to various schools every Wednesday for the teachers to use them to deliver the curriculum.