Uganda Humanist Schools Trust has just published an update report on the past year of progress at Isaac Newton School, Katera, Uganda. Despite the setbacks brought by the Covid Pandemic, the report is truly inspiring.

Update on Isaac Newton High School

For a school in a poor rural area, this year’s exam results were outstanding. In the O-level exams, 21 students gained an aggregate of Grade 1 (a level attained by only 6% of students in Uganda). In national league tables the school ranked 143^rd out of 4,123 school in Uganda. Grades in science were so high that the Exam Board insisted on the students being given a supplementary oral exam, which confirmed the high attainment levels shown by the exam marks.

A-level performance was even better. 92% of Isaac Newton students gained the university entrance level and no single candidate recorded a fail grade. Sadly, fears of Covid have closed all schools and universities since March, so their best cohort yet have not been able to progress to university or to vocational colleges.

Peter Kisirinya, the school’s Director, writes of the huge beneficial impact that the school is having on the rural economy. The school provides direct employment to 52 people in the area, with a further hundred jobs being supported indirectly.

The transformation in local production and living standards brought about by the school is enormous. This is evident as you come into the area, where houses have been rebuilt and modernised and people are wearing better clothes and have more goods available to them. Extending electricity has attracted new families to the area. New houses have been constructed and the local market is busier. Maize and coffee processing factories have been built. A modern poultry farm with 90,000 birds has been attracted and this employs 33 youths. Roads are now regularly maintained by local government because the area generates the taxes to cover the costs.

Once we get through the Covid crisis, the school is confident will be able to get back to the high standards of education and welfare that they were attaining before the shutdown and they will continue to transform the life chances of many young people in rural Uganda.

Covid has hit schools in Uganda very hard.

The virus was brought into Uganda with a plane load of passengers from Dubai in mid-March. Most of those passengers were quarantined and the country went into lock-down. All schools were instructed to close before the first term ended in March, with the expectation that they would reopen in May. Covid has been slow to take off in Uganda, with just over 1,000 cases to date and no deaths but, nevertheless, the Uganda government has taken a precautionary approach. School closures were extended and the President has now asked them to prepare to reopen in September. The students have already lost a full term’s schooling.

Normally the collective scholarship payments from UHST supporters cover 50% of the running costs of Mustard Seed School and about 40% at Isaac Newton School. During the shutdown, the schools lost their local fee income, but they still have ongoing costs, for water and electricity, local and national rates and taxes and, most importantly, staff salaries. They receive no funds from the Uganda government.

The Humanist schools have worked hard to retain staff during the lockdown. The schools have always tried to foster a strong team spirit among staff, teachers and ancillary workers. Reliable pay, fringe benefits and annual staff bonuses paid by UHST have been an important part of this. In order to support their staff during the closure, schools have been paying 50% of normal salaries. This has only been possible because UHST has continued to transfer your regular monthly scholarship payments. Although there have been no children in school, this money has helped to ensure that the children have a school to return to.

The one compensation is that the school closure has enabled UHST to help the schools to make progress in a number of areas:

1. 

   We have completed the nursery and infant sections of a new Humanist primary school at Katumba, Bundibugyo, on the Congo border, where 100 fathers were killed in a futile witchdoctor-led insurrection.

2. Work is well advanced on the foundations of a new hall at Isaac Newton School
3. A much needed second boys’ dormitory at Mustard Seed School is progressing.
4. We have registered, as a not-for-profit company, the Humanist primary and secondary school at Kanungu, near Bwindi, the site of a dreadful massacre of 800 people by religious fanatics.

Current expectations are that children will return to school in September, after an extended summer holiday. The government is proposing to run the final term up to the end of December, to give students an opportunity to catch up on the substantial amount of work they have missed. National examinations, if they are held, will move back from October to the end of December.

Covid has caused huge problems for everyone in Uganda, and especially for school staff and, more particularly, for children and students. They could not have managed without the money from UHST supporters, which has given them an essential lifeline during the Covid crisis. They are hugely grateful to UHST supporters for the help you have given them in these unprecedented times.

The virus has curtailed economic activity in Uganda and destroyed the livelihoods of many poor families. When the schools reopen, children not receiving UHST scholarships, will find it difficult to pay fees. This, in turn, will make it hard for the schools to pay their teachers. Our priority, at UHST, is to harness funds to help our schools to not only survive the current financial shock but also to re-establish the momentum they had before the crisis hit. We can do this with your continued support.

In order to understand the context in which the small but growing number of Humanist Schools in Uganda are working, we need an overview of the education system. The most reliable source of information is the National Census of 2014, the results of which were published in 2017. The broad picture will not have changed substantially since then.

With historic fertility rates as high as 7 children per woman, the school-age population in Uganda has been growing apace. In the year 2000, realising that it would not be able to meet the demand for new schools, the Uganda government liberalised the school system allowing a variety of private and community organisations to set up schools. Religious organisations were quick to see an opportunity to extend their influence over Ugandan society. New schools were established by the protestant Church of Uganda, the Catholic Church, Evangelical Protestant Churches (supported largely by American congregations) and by different Moslem groups, who provide 10-15% of religious schools.

*Many schools receive some government support.
Source Uganda Census 2014 (Analysis 2017).

Entrepreneurs were the next biggest group founding schools. Many saw schools as a business opportunity and founded them as private companies running for profit. Schools have also been set up by local people to serve the needs of a community. Government schools form a small minority of the total. The Humanist Schools, which are private schools run on a charitable basis fit in the Others category.

Since the liberalisation of education, the number of schools has increased greatly, as has the proportion of children in full-time education. Among today’s young people, 17% attend pre-school, 80% go to primary, 44% to secondary school, and 4% go on to University level courses. All schools expect fees or other financial contributions from families. In rural areas, livelihoods are from subsistence farming. The little cash families earn derives from the sale of surplus food or cash crops. So, for many Ugandans, incomes are low and unreliable. Meeting the school fees for all members of a family is a major challenge. Consequently, school drop-out rates are high. 40% of boys and 49% of girls leave primary school before taking their Primary Leaving Examination (PLE). Of the children who complete their primary education, a further 38% drop out before O-level exams.

Although many young people now gain an education, among the general working population (aged 13-59) the proportion of educated people remains low. In 2014, only 9.6% of the working population had completed primary school, 8% had an O-level, 3% an A-level and only 2% had a degree-level qualification.

With such low general levels of education, new school leavers with O and A-levels can do very well in the job market. Those that secure a paid job can create a good life themselves and also help to support their family members back in the villages. The Humanist Schools are a small part of the total. However, they provide a unique education based on the values of reason, compassion and tolerance. Together they are transforming the life chances of very many young people every year and helping to lift out of poverty the fortunate communities where they operate.