Education Support

A LACK OF EARLY EDUCATION INCREASES POVERTY AND LIMITS GROWTH

Education Support

The educational system in Uganda consists of three levels: seven years of compulsory primary education, six years at the secondary level, and the minimum of three years of higher education in college or university. The government provides free primary and partial funding of secondary and college education.

Primary education has been free and compulsory in Uganda since the last two decades. At the end of their seventh year, pupils take national exams administered by the Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB) for the award of the Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE). Less than 50 per cent of primary school pupils continue on to secondary education. Based on their UCE results students are admitted to any of the more than 8,500 secondary schools that are of different tiers (national, regional, county, and local community run schools) and other privately run schools for those that can afford.

Although tuition costs for secondary education are partially covered by government (for some schools), other costs such as the school development fund, maintenance, uniforms, boarding fees, and other expenses make secondary education very expensive for most students to afford. As a result, many bright but poor students that excel in their UCE exams and get admitted into secondary schools often fail to attend these schools due to the prohibitive educational costs. They end up dropping out of further schooling or opt to attend local and community run secondary schools that are cheap but under-resourced. This wastes talent of bright but poor students and denying their families’ chances of breaking intergenerational poverty. 

Students who manage to go through the six years of secondary school once again take a national examination for the award of the Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE). Based on their UCE results students are admitted to universities and middle level colleges. Just like secondary schools, the government partially funds students to attend these colleges and universities, still making tertiary education out of reach for many students because they cannot afford to pay the cost even with the partial funding, hence they drop out with no sellable skill. 

Attending a well-resourced secondary school often translates to good education and admission to a college or university.

Access to a college or university by students from poor families means acquisition of knowledge and skills relevant to the job market opportunities to start moving their families out of poverty. This is why education is a key pillar and indeed the main gateway for getting individuals and families out of poverty. Supporting the education of a poor student will immediately reduce a major burden to their family and make resources available for food and other basic needs and hence reduce poverty.

Please, support these students and address poverty in poor communities.

Key questions we answer

For each barrier, you can go to its page that will give you answers to five questions:

  • What is the barrier and how is it defined?
  • What makes it a barrier to enrollment, participation, and completion?
  • How pervasive is it?
  • What are our partners doing to address it?
  • What are useful sources for further reading?

The complexity of reality

Every situation is complex, and children may be faced with several barriers simultaneously. Lack of access to education for a particular set of children may be the result of a combination of multiple barriers. In such cases, problems can be adequately and sustainably addressed only through a combination of strategies that recognize the complexity of barriers.

For each barrier, we give examples of our partners that are addressing it. However, the example given may be only one of several strategies a partner is employing simultaneously in its initiative to address out of school children (OOSC) in a particular country or region.

Main Barriers to Education

  • Poverty
  • Conflicts
  • Rural areas
  • Gender: Early Marriage
  • Violence in and around schools

Children’s Right to Education

The inalienable right of every child to a quality education was first acknowledged in 1948 in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).  Adopted by the UN General Assembly on 10 December 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) states that: everyone has the right to education and that it should be free at least at the primary level. Not only does everyone have the right to a free and compulsory primary education, that education should focus on full human development, strengthen respect for human rights, and promote understanding, tolerance and friendship (UDHR Article 26).  

The 1960, UNESCO Convention Against Discrimination in Education reinforces the right to a free and compulsory quality primary education as is laid out in the 1948 UDHR, and further mandates that discrimination in education is a violation of human rights.  It sets out that discrimination in education includes any distinction, exclusion, limitation or preference that is based on race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, economic condition or birth. 

The Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989 further defined children’s right to education.  The Millennium Development Goals and other international conventions have since reinforced education as a universal right to be guaranteed to ALL CHILDREN.

Rights-based approach

Accessing and receiving a quality education is a universal human right. Educate A Child’s work is founded in the right of ALL CHILDREN around the world to access a quality education that respects and promotes their right to dignity and full development.

There are three important aspects of education as a human right:

  • Participation in quality education in itself;
  • The practice of human rights in education; and
  • Education as a right that facilitates the fulfilment of other rights.

Our work is based on a number of international instruments that identify education as a human right.  Several of these international instruments indicate the desired nature, or quality of this education.  When we look at these instruments together and interpret them we go far beyond single articles to a web of commitments that speaks to the depth and breadth of how to begin to understand educational quality.

Interpretation of the various instruments with regard to quality education must be embedded within the overall current local and world contexts and expectations of education. That is, education must be placed and understood in terms of the larger context. A quality education must reflect learning in relation to the learner as an individual, a family and community member, and part of a world society.

A quality education understands the past, is relevant to the present and has a view to the future. Quality education relates to knowledge building and the skillful application of all forms of knowledge by unique individuals who function both independently and in relation to others. A quality education reflects the dynamic nature of culture and languages, the value of the individual in relation to the larger context, and the importance of living in a way that promotes equality in the present and fosters a sustainable future.