A wish for rural leaners in the pandemic

Francis, a 12-year-old orphan living in the rural Luweero District in Uganda, recently emerged as the top student for his village in the Primary Leaving Exams. He also scored the first first grade for his school in more than 20 years.
 
Unlike 70 percent of his rural schoolmates who drop out annually, and continue to after schools are closed for in-person learning, he remained in school, thanks to the support of his grandmother and teachers. Now he has a secondary school scholarship.

Sadly, he is an anomaly in Uganda with a population of close to 50 million people, the median age of 16, and over 15 million children who are school age. When the Covid-19 pandemic hit in March 2020, all these children were sent home. 

Just like more than 100 million of their counterparts across the globe affected by Covid-19 school closures, millions of children in Uganda, specifically the majority with no access to electricity or internet to do online learning, have suffered irreversible learning losses that could be detrimental to them as well as to our nation’s economic and social development.  

Of course, this issue is bigger than Uganda. The World Bank estimates that 1.7 billion students globally were out of school due to the pandemic, and at least 600 million students have not yet returned to school. 

Jaime Saavedra, the head of the education and global practice at the World Bank, warns that the “learning loss” from school closures could reduce future lifetime earnings of these children by $10 trillion, sharply impeding their opportunities in life and holding back broader economic development for their countries.
 
The learning crisis facing low-income countries, particularly those in sub-Saharan Africa, is already deepening inequities and entrenching communities in poverty. 

However, the pandemic exacerbated this challenge that global education agencies such as the World Education Commission, UNESCO, and many others have even called it the learning catastrophe for the world’s children, and called for governments and development partners to prioritize seven action areas. 

Chief among them is the reopening of schools safely and treating teachers as frontline workers. I agree. 

To be sure, governments and development partners have done some Covid-19 adaptation programmes to mitigate the crisis, but they work best when there is Internet access and radio coverage. 

In Uganda, unfortunately, the majority of the 15 million students have been out of school for over 18 months now. 

The situation is not any different from our southern Africa counterparts in Zambia, Botswana, and Malawi, in fact UNICEF estimates more than 60 million children are out of school in East and southern Africa due to school closures, citing the Covid-19 new delta variant restrictions. 

The President has pegged the reopening of schools on fully vaccinating our 700,000 teachers and 12–18-year-old students. 

However, experts argue that waiting until this occurs will only exacerbate the “wasting away” of children, cause more teachers to drop out of the profession, and in the end hurt the nation’s current and future economic prospects. 

The president and education leaders at the Ministry of Education and Sports are facing mounting pressure from parents, teachers, and experts to reopen schools. 

In all this rhetoric, not much has been said or even written about the wishes of the most affected, Uganda’s rural UPE and USE learners. 

When we asked Francis, our top student and his counterparts, who are all waiting in limbo for the safe reopening of schools what their wishes are before the end of 2021. 

Their answers were unanimous: For schools to be reopened. For teachers to be vaccinated. For students return to school sooner and learn safely. 

 I concur with the children. Covid-19 school closures are not only denying them their right to learn, but also affecting their social and emotional wellbeing, not to mention wasting away their talents that would be explored through physical activity. 

Despite several interventions piloted in Uganda and across sub-Saharan Africa, none has a proven record affording these millions of children a chance to effectively learn as being back in school, especially when Internet or radios are still out of reach for many. 

Vaccines are coming into Uganda and this is promising, however, as of this week, only 16 percent of the 550,000 teachers targeted had received both jabs. 

The World Health Organization continues to warn of vaccine inequality, citing that getting to the continent’s 10 percent protection is a daunting task. 

It is imperative that government and global partners hasten the procurement and distribution of vaccines specifically targeted for teachers and students. They must be prioritized. 

In the meantime, we must also invest more intentionally in interventions that extend learning to rural learners in Uganda so that the dreams of students like Francis are secure to safeguard our nation’s future. 

James Kassaga Arinaitwe, Executive Director Teach For Uganda