Africa: Pupils Call for 'Wholistic’ Secondary Education

11 June 2003
allAfrica.com
By Ofeibea Quist-Arcton

Kampala — On the second day of a conference on secondary education in Africa, two Ugandan students - both in their final year at school - were invited to address the delegates.

The conference participants are meeting outside the capital Kampala, in a bid to forge the way ahead for workable policies to enhance the secondary school sector all over the continent. The Bank, which has stressed this is a 'technical’ and not a 'political’ meeting, organized the week-long event along with the Paris-based Association for Development of Education in Africa and the Academy for Educational Development (AED), headquartered in Washington DC

Teachers, school heads, education specialists, technicians, a few African government officials - and donors - are all part of the gathering. So too are a select few pupils, among them Irene Nakalembe and Joshua Byabashaija.

Confident and articulate, the head girl of Makerere College School - a 1500-strong government secondary institution - and her classmate, who is himself the treasurer of the Students’ council, wowed the adult audience with passion and straight talk as they outlined their vision for secondary education in Africa.

Here is what they said.

My name is Irene Nakalembe from Makerere College School. I’m privileged to have been chosen to represent the African student at this first regional conference on secondary education in Africa.

The issues that I have to point out today are issues that I myself as a student face, or I myself as a student would like to see in secondary education in Africa, plus research that I have carried out on the students, that we have carried out, me and Joshua, on the students that are at my school, Makerere College School.

Primarily, we would like to see an education system where the student is empowered with leadership skills. In our school, this system has been started up, although it’s not seen in very many schools.

We have the Students’ Council, we have the prefectorate and we have many other students that lead the students from within. We also have students who inspire their peers, other students, and these are the students who present the views of the students to the administration. So we, as the students, have a voice in decision-making and a voice in the issues that concern our school.

Secondly, we wish to have an education system where we have access to information technology. In the film that we saw, most of the schools in Uganda don’t have access to information technology, basically the PC or the desktop computer in the rural schools. Yet when you realise that, when you go out to look for employment, to look for a desk job, you have to have at least some slight information about technology.

You have to know, at least, word processing. And this is something that is provided in very few schools and not in all schools in Africa. So, this is an education system that we hope could be provided in Africa.

Thirdly, we wish to see a system where a child is placed in focus with moral education, provided by the teachers you find at school and the parents you find at school, by the counsellors, even by fellow students. We are taught Moral Studies where the student is built up to care about his neighbour.

In our school, the School Council set up a Help Your Neighbour project. There are those students in the education system who lack certain basic needs. So, at the end of term, you realise that most of the boarding school students, for instance, have books and pens. And yet, when they go home their parents will provide them with more. So they will not need what they already have.

So, by teaching people to give out what they have, they are able to learn about the necessity of sharing and the necessity of helping somebody who does not have. They can also appreciate that, in our society, we have those who do not have, but we can also help them to, at least, attain something and be like the rest of us.

Lastly, in my research, I would like to have a system where we are exposed to conferences like this one. And I would like to thank the organisers very much. We would also like to debate in parliamentary sessions so that we know we are people who know the demands of the society and people who know the different types of employment opportunities available. We would have a person who is likely to think globally and locally and someone who is aware of the economy.

In other words, we have an education system that produces a whole person, not just in intellect, but in morals, society values and religious intellect.

Thank you very much.

My name is Byabashaija Joshua. I am in Makerere College School, in Senior 6, and I’ll be finishing in five months’ time and I’ll be in the job market! (Laughter)

In Makerere College, I happen to be the treasurer of the Students’ Council. In my time as treasurer, I have come to learn a few things and to interact more with the students and I’d like to pass on a few ideas that I’ve adapted.

One thing that is lacking in secondary education in our country, is a tendency to think that once you are a secondary student, you are mature enough to be able to think and know what to do, know what is right and what is wrong, the ability to know what you’re doing in school in other words, which I think we don’t know.

For example, students in these schools have a lot of problems, from back home. They often find they have nobody to approach, to confide in and get assistance.

So in analyzing this, I would like to request the delegates here to push for counselling services in all secondary schools. As a student counsellor, I notice many things. Students are afraid to approach you and tell you their problems. They may be more willing to approach a professional who is hired by the school, because they will be assured of confidentiality of whatever matters they talk about and further help.

For example if you approach me and tell me you don’t have school fees, what can I do? But if you approach an elder, perhaps something can be done.

In Makerere College, as treasurer, we have introduced a humanitarian appeal. This is a project where we assist people, both within the school and outside, people who are not able to cater for certain needs - perhaps medical.

My counterpart talked about the Help Your Neighbour Project. I have noticed that we children, we are a power, because we have the ability to sympathise with our friends. Empathy! We can feel the pain of our friends. Here comes a person; for example we have one at Makerere College. You come from the north, your parents were abducted (during the war) and you can’t afford even the basic needs. I’m talking about sugar, some pocket money etc. But the students contribute towards this aim. And we have helped to maintain many people in school.

So I would like to build these values within secondary school students, so that even later, in future, you can leave school, you may have all the certificates, but you can’t get a job, but somebody could help you. This is good neighbourliness.

Career guidance is another big issue that is lacking in our education system. This is where you find a person like me, in five months I’m out of school, but I don’t know where to next. I’m just finishing school because I have to finish. (Laughter).

Or perhaps you may find another category. A person will tell you... you ask the person what do you want to become in future? He will say 'a lawyer’. You ask why? "My dad is a lawyer". Why do you want to become a doctor? Why? "My big brother is a doctor".

That should not be the case. Students should be guided right from the elementary stages of their secondary school to know what they need to study in order to get there. What are the advantages of getting where you’re going? And, in that way, we will produce better citizens of this world.

Another major obstacle we have in our education system in Africa, is that we read for exams. We are being trained that in order to be successful, you have to pass your exams - which shouldn’t be the case.

For example, I’d like to point out certain issues. You might find that a student is very good at least minute reading (revision). And this person is always relaxed until the last minute, when they decide to read.

So what happens in the case of your final examinations if you fall sick? My last examination is in November. But what happens if I fall sick in October? Does it mean I’m useless? That’s not the case!

We could introduce a system where a student is continuously checked in many ways: ability to talk to people, ability to listen, ability to interact with others, ability to participate in class and other fields like that, to avoid last minute panic which will bring about cases where people have to buy examination papers and cheat and malpractices like that.

We would like a system where teachers in their training - I don’t know if it happens like that - where teachers’ esteem is boosted. Here, for example, in Uganda, if I walked into a classroom now and asked how many people want to become teachers, raise your hands, you would see one person. This may be in the category 'because my parent is a successful teacher’. But the rest don’t want that. The rest take it as the last priority.

If I fail to become a lawyer, or I fail to become a doctor and I fail to become this, well if things are too harsh, I’ll just become a teacher. So in the end you produce teachers who have to teach, but don’t want to teach. They just have to teach, because they have to, but not because they want to.

This is not good, because you watch a teacher walk into your class all gloomy (laughter), writing on the board and walking out after. What have you gained? You have just written down notes. When the exam comes, you’re going to fail. And this teacher is not going to look at you.

We’d like teachers to be trained to know that we are all different. We have different capabilities. I have a different capability to Irene. Know that, and use my strong points to raise me, to build me up and make me a better person. Do not assume we are at the same level, because we can never be.

Lastly, in the views I collected around school, we would like as the students - the people you are trying to plan for - we’d like this learning process to be more student-oriented.

What am I talking about? I’m talking about avoiding the teachers being the ones to do all the work. Besides, there are many things involved in facilitating schools - providing textbooks for instance. Students should be told that research is not supposed to be a burden, but is supposed to help you.

Because, often, we have found that you can enter a class and the teacher misinforms you, not intentionally, but because you have not done wide research. To add a voice to what Irene talked about, if we could improve information technology, and you could give me some research, I’d go to the net and find out more, I come back and we discuss it. That would be better learning than, 'write down these notes, go read them,’ or something like that.

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