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Civil society organizations have called on the Ministry of Education and Sports to improve the performance of the education department in the Karamoja sub-region.
According to the report released by Anti-Corruption Coalition Uganda, the Karamoja sub-region performed poorly in the national exams raising concerns over the relevance of development partners and government supporting education in the region.
In 2022, the region obtained 319 candidates in division one in the National exams of Primary Leaving Examination- PLE.
The report further cited Nakapiripirit district which performed poorly in the Uganda Certificate of Education-UCE examinations in the whole country after failing to obtain any single candidate in division one while Nabilatuk district had two.
However, despite several government and donor-funded intervention programs such as Universal primary and secondary education, Karamoja primary education program supported by Irish Aid, the WFP school feeding initiative, and all other interventions aimed at supporting education in the region, the performances in schools have not improved.
Stephen Bazira Geoffrey, the Senior Finance Officer at Anti-Corruption Coalition Uganda attributed the poor performances to teacher’s absenteeism.
Bazira noted that there is a need for the Ministry of Education and school management committees to heighten supervision to curb teacher absenteeism.
He urged the Education Ministry to scale up education programming for children with special needs in the region as a separate investment with specific interventions geared toward ensuring that no child is left behind.
Bazira also said that the government should allocate more resources for procuring learning materials, constructing teaching facilities, and facilitating teachers in hard-to-reach areas so as to get better results at school.
Lucy Akajo, the Karamoja Regional Coordinator for Uganda National Teacher Union attributed school poor performances to the negative attitude towards education among the communities in the region.
Akajo observed that the government in partnership with other development agencies has tried everything possible to keep children at school but many do not value education.
She noted that several children have been awarded full school bursaries to study but very few complete the circle of education due to a negative attitude and not willing to learn.
Akajo also revealed that the teachers are finding it difficult to teach the children whose parents are not supportive in the process of learning.
Raymond Korobe, the Nabilatuk District Education Officer noted inadequate infrastructures such as classrooms and staff accommodation have greatly affected their school performance.
Korobe said that many schools in his district are conducting lessons under the trees and the classes are frequently disrupted during rainy seasons.
Bernadette Nabankema, a pastoral social worker at Regina Mundi Cathedral noted that although there are several challenges frustrating education in the region, at least many parents have accepted to keep their children at school.
Nabankema said that the situation was worst in the early days when parents never wanted to hear anyone campaigning for children to go to school.
She revealed that as a church, they are committed to continuing drumming the communities to embrace education by allowing their children to stay at school.
Currently, there are 3,417 teachers in the 308 schools for primary, secondary, and tertiary institutions across the region.