200 Mityana pupils to resit PLE over exam malpractice

St Charles Lwanga Kabule Roman Catholic Primary School whose 2018 PLE results were cancelled by Uganda National Examinations Board. PHOTO BY BARBRA NALWEYISO

MITYANA- The Uganda National Examinations Board (Uneb) has finally cancelled Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) results for 244 candidates in Mityana District at the conclusion of its investigations.

The affected candidates are among the 3,500 pupils who sat for the 2018 national exams and their results were withheld by Uneb in January following suspected involvement in various exam malpractice.

The affected pupils were attending Kabule Church of Uganda Primary School, which had 94 candidates, St Charles Lwanga Kabule Roman Catholic Primary School (149 candidates) and Kyankowe Primary School (one candidate).

Candidates from the other two schools sat their exams from St Charles Lwanga Kabule Roman Catholic Primary School which has an examination centre.

Mr James Muwanga Kironde, the Mityana Municipal inspector of schools, said the affected candidates and their teachers were recently invited by Uneb after both the external and internal security committees carried out investigation which revealed that the pupils received external assistance during exams.

“Basing on the evidence Uneb gathered from scouts and witnessed by candidates and invigilators, Uneb discovered that there was massive smuggling of unauthorised materials inside the examination room,” Mr Kironde said during an interview on Monday .

He said the Uneb internal security committee also resolved to take disciplinary action against the area examinations supervisor.
Mr Kironde advised head teachers of the affected schools to explain to parents so that they can register their children to resit final examinations this year.

Following the development, some councillors on the health and education committee in Mityana Municipal Council have called for demotion of the head teachers in the affected schools and also ban on supervisors who manned exams.

However, other councillors have outrightly rejected the proposal, saying it is the invigilators and supervisors to blame.
“All the mess happened under their watch and there are reasons why they should be penalised,” Mr Damien Kasajja, the secretary for health and education committee, said. Mr Joseph Kiwanuka, the head teacher of St Charles Kabule Roman Catholic Primary School, said the school was not given a fair hearing.

‘’Many people don’t like us, one of the scouts was not even meant to be at our school because her appointment letter was indicating Kabula not Kabule. That is the same person who gave false information to Uneb with the intention of tarnishing the name of the school,” he said.
He said many parents of the affected candidates have accepted to take their children back to the school so that they can sit final exams this year.

“As we talk, almost half of the affected candidates have come back and we hope they will perform well this year,” he added.
Mr Paul Mubiru, a parent, said they have agreed with the school administration to allow them pay half of the school fees.

Background
In the entire district, out of the 8,284 candidates who sat PLE, only 886 got first grade, a total of 3,451 were in second grade while 1,564 and 316 candidates passed in third grade and fourth grade respectively.

A total of 836 candidates were ungraded while 239 didn’t not show up for the exams.
The district education officer, Mr Gerald Ssali, said there was a slight improvement in the 2018 PLE performance compared to the previous year.
In the 2017 PLE results, Mityana Municipality was ranked 41 with 306 pupils passing in first grade, second grade (1,392), third grade (493) and fourth grade (403), while 282 failed completely.

Mityana District has a total of 119 public primary schools and 160 private schools while early childhood development centres (nursery schools) are 170.