Africa-Press – Uganda. Selection exercise for Senior One, Senior Five and first year students of tertiary institutions will be conducted between September and October.
Education and Sports minister Janet Museveni said the ministry will provide specific dates for the exercise for the three levels of education.
She was speaking during the release of the 2020 Uganda Advanced Certificate of Education (UACE) exams results at State House Nakasero in Kampala on Friday.
“We envisage the selection exercise to be completed in the period of September and October to enable progression of learners to the next level,” Ms Museveni said.
The minister had earlier last month during the release of Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) and Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE) exams results said the government would set dates for selection of Senior One and Senior Five students after the lockdown had been lifted.
The 42-day lockdown that was instituted by President Museveni on June 18 was lifted by himself on July 30.
Parents and schools whose candidates sat for the PLE and UCE exams had now waited for 20 days since the lifting of the lockdown without any news on the dates for the selection exercise.
Some traditional schools had resorted to receiving applications for both S1 and S5 students online, only to be discouraged by the Education ministry on the grounds that it would lock out some students without access to the Internet.
Sources told this newspaper that the ministry is likely to set the date for Senior One selection before the end of this month.
Heads of schools will be required to converge at Uganda Manufacturers Association (UMA) showground to select students. The exercise usually takes two days.
Meanwhile, Ms Museveni said those who will be selected will not immediately report to schools.
“The date of reporting will be communicated to the public as part of a revised schools calendar once a reopening date has been agreed upon by Cabinet,” Ms Museveni said.
Excellent performance
At the same function, Ms Museveni expressed happiness with the performance of candidates at UACE, asserting that her ministry had a share of good surprise this season despite the Covid-19 hurdles.
“From the results, you can see that 70 per cent of the candidates in 2020 compared with 64 per cent in 2019 attained two or more principle passes to qualify them for progression to university education,” Ms Museveni said.
“This improvement in the other two examinations for Primary Seven and Senior Four previously released confirms the fact that our continuity of learning interventions during the period of school closure were not in vain,” Ms Museveni added.
She also commended the Uganda National Examination Board (Uneb) for tightening the nuts against examination malpractice.
According to Uneb, the results of about 100 students were withheld, which the board said is the lowest for the last five years.
“I am glad to note that examination malpractices have continued to decline overall in PLE, UCE and now UACE,” Ms Museveni said.
