Prime
Teacher shortage cripples education sector in Pallisa
A teacher conducts a lesson at Victorious Primary School, Kampala, in May. Pallisa District is facing a severe shortage of teachers, inadequate infrastructure, and poor learning conditions. Photo | File
What you need to know:
- The head teacher of Gogonyo Primary School, Mr Simon Patrick Otibu, said the district should prioritise the recruitment of more teachers to cope with the overwhelming number of pupils on the Universal Primary Education (UPE) programme.
Pallisa District is facing a severe shortage of teachers, inadequate infrastructure, and poor learning conditions, stakeholders in the education sector have revealed.
During a dialogue meeting organised by the Citizen Initiative for Democracy and Development (CIDD-Ug) on Monday, the Pallisa District Education Officer (DEO), Ms Agnes Lukendo, said there are 76 government-aided primary schools in the district, most of which are struggling to provide quality education due to high pupil-to-teacher ratio, lack of pit-latrines and inadequate classrooms.
“Most schools in the district are in dire need of infrastructure development,” Ms Lukendo said.
Ms Lukendo said due to limited resources, the district is unable to address challenges.
“We are doing our best to address the teacher shortage and improve infrastructure, but we need resources,” she said, adding, “The district is meant to have 1,823 teachers but instead have 1,123 teachers, giving us a deficit of 700 teachers. The high pupil-to-teacher ratio is quite a big gap to cope with,” she said, adding that the district has about 96,000 learners.
The current teacher-to-pupil ratio in the district stands at 1:120 and yet it’s supposed to be 1:80.
The head teacher of Gogonyo Primary School, Mr Simon Patrick Otibu, said the district should prioritise the recruitment of more teachers to cope with the overwhelming number of pupils on the Universal Primary Education (UPE) programme.
“Each school should be given teachers based on the enrolment to meet the required minimum standards. Unfortunately, schools are facing a shortage of teachers, which factor contributes to poor performance,” he said.
Mr Otibu said the lack of staff accommodation at schools is also forcing some teachers to travel long distances to work.
“Because of this, the teachers report late to work, are exhausted and fail to perform to their expectations,” he said.
A performance report for the 2015 to 2022 UPE cycle by CIDD-Ug also revealed that about 54 percent of the pupils, who enrolled in Primary One in 2015, did not complete the primary cycle in 2022.
Mr Enock Nampeke, the Pallisa County Inspector of Schools, attributed the district’s poor academic performance to the high dropout rate among learners.
“This is affecting class management and is significantly impacting the quality of teaching and learning,” he said.
Mr Nampeke urged the government to review some of the policies it put in place such as automatic promotion, which he said were unfair and hindered the education sector.
The District Inspector of Schools, Ms Jesca Ojangole, said parents’ reluctance to support school feeding programmes remains a significant challenge.
“Five perent of schools in the district are attempting to implement the feeding programme but the greater percentage have failed to embrace the programme,” she said.
