Africa-Press – Uganda. A total of 715,360 candidates in government primary and secondary schools can now concentrate on sitting their final exams starting in October after Arts teachers lifted their strike yesterday.
According to the Uganda National Examinations Board (Uneb) roadmap, national examinations kick off on October 14 to November 18 for the Uganda Certificate Education (UCE) while Uganda Advanced Certificate of Education exams begin on November 18 to December. Primary Leaving Examinations (PLE) will commence on November 7. The timetables are expected to be out by August 31.
Mr Dan Odongo, the Uneb’s executive director, in a July 1 statement indicated that of the 1,279,962 candidates who registered for this year’s examinations at all levels, 715,360 of them are funded by the government. Registration for this year’s national examinations ended on June 30.
While their private counterparts have been attending school, learners in government schools have to do catch-up.
Mr David Muyanja, the deputy head teacher of Police Children School in Kibuli, a UPE school in Nsambya Police Barracks, yesterday told Daily Monitor yesterday that they are not prepared for PLE since learning has not been happening in the last three weeks.
“We are not prepared. We would have been doing evaluation on these children but they were at home. If the government opens the dialogue and comes to a conclusive solution, we shall start from there,” Mr Muyanja said.
He asked the government to consider extending the timetable to enable schools recover the lost time. Mr Muyanja also appealed to the government to consider the teachers’ demands.
“If government is to be genuine, they should look at our demands. This issue runs from 2018 when they signed the collective bargaining agreement. By now, they would have reached 100 percent increment that we demanded. What is painful is to increase money for some people and leave out others,” he said.
According to Uneb, of the 349,324 candidates who have registered for exams at UCE, 114, 260 candidates are funded by the government under the Universal Secondary Education and of the 832,702 candidates registered for PLE, 583,763 are sponsored by government under Universal Primary Education.
Out of 97,936 candidates who have registered for Uneb at UACE level, 17,337 candidates are funded by government a under the Universal Post-O level Education and Training Programme.
P7 candidates speak out
Robinah Clare Alum, P7:
“During Covid, we were at home for two years. I appeal to government to listen to the teachers’ outcry so that they can teach us. I’m having challenges in some subjects, especially mathematics. We have not been tough about constructions and graphs yet they normally set questions about them.”
Salume Alwedo 13:
“I was not able to understand P6 work well because of Covid. We have not done much work in P.7 yet we are expected to sit for PLE soon. I request government to fulfil its promise of increasing teachers’ salary so that they can come back and teach us.”
Haashim, Kyakuwa, 12:
“I’m disappointed because of what is happening in my school. Government must give the teachers what they want. It will affect us so much because I doubt whether we shall cover all topics. We are really in trouble.”
Patience Namuzungu, P7:
“How do they expect us to pass PLE? We are praying for our teachers to come back and I hope God will listen to our prayers.”
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