Why Makerere scrapped 19 courses

Makerere University is phasing out 19 undergraduate courses effective 2021/2022 academic year as one of the ways to transform it into a research-led institution.

Vice Chancellor Prof Barnabas Nawangwe, told Daily Monitor in an interview on Monday that the exercise aims to eliminate duplication, harmonise and reduce teaching load on staff to eneble them do research.

“We want to remain with only 62 undergraduate courses so that the staff can concentrate on the available courses and conduct more research because our aim is for Makerere to become a research-led university,” Prof Nawangwe said.

 In an interview yesterday, the university director of quality assurance, Dr Vincent Ssembatya, said the courses that have been merged had 40 per cent similarity in their curriculum content.

It remained unclear how senate, the university’s top academic organ, approved these courses in the first place or why they were run for decades.

Dr Ssembatya said some courses such as Bachelor of Computer Engineering will be merged with Bachelor of Electrical Engineering, Bachelor of Business Statistics will be merged with Bachelor of Statistics, while Bachelor of Development Economics will be merged with Bachelor of Economics.
 
“The principle we took in to identify the phased-out course was their similarity in the content,” he said.

He said Makerere will now concentrate on courses that are not offered by most universities and on graduate students to increase the number of PhD graduates.

Dr Ssembatya said the affected students will continue with the courses until they complete them.
 He also said the lecturers teaching the phased-out courses will not be affected.

However, the decision has not been welcomed by some affected students, saying the university has rendered their courses useless.

Ms Joan Nalunkuuma, a Third Year student of Community Psychology, said the university has not informed them about the new development and their fate.

“I am against the university scrapping off our psychology course because our services are much needed given the pandemic that has left many hopeless,” Ms Nalunkuuma said.

Ms Phiona Batamuriza, another student of one of the scrapped programmes, said the move by the university has rendered them ‘useless’ because they cannot continue studying a course that has been scrapped.

Phased out courses

2021/2022 courses
Bachelor of Science in Horticulture
Bachelor of Science in Human Nutrition
Bachelor of Science in Meteorology
Bachelor of Science in Wildlife Health and Mgt.
Bachelor of Adult and Community Education
Bachelor of Agricultural Extension Education
Bachelor of Arts in Development Economics
Bachelor of Community Psychology
Bachelor of Development Studies
Bachelor of Industrial and Organizational Psychology
Bachelor of Science in Business Statistics
Bachelor of Science in Conservation Biology
Bachelor of Science in Telecommunication Engineering
Bachelor of Science in Quantitative Economics
Bachelor of Agricultural and Rural Innovation
Bachelor of Library and Information Sciences.
Bachelor of Archives and Record Management
Bachelor of Science and Constructive Management
Bachelor of Computer Engineering.

Earlier phased out courses
Bachelor of Arts in Dance
Bachelor of Conservation Forestry & Product Tech
Bachelor of Science in Dairy Industry and Business
Bachelor of Science in Information Technology.
Bachelor of Science in Feed Industry and Business
Bachelor of Science in Leather Industry and Business
Bachelor of Science in Meat Industry and Business
Bachelor of Science in Poultry Industry and Business
Bachelor of Science in Surveying
Bachelor of Social and Entrepreneur Forestry

dmukhaye@ug.nationmedia.com