Spotlight: 'Liberalisation of education sector has gone astray'

Stakeholders in the education sector have called for a policy to control and regulate what they have describe as over liberalisation of the sector that they say has made many institutions not to focus on instilling morals among children.

They say the focus has changed from imparting morals and knowledge into learners to harvesting cash from them as clients a factor that reduces the country’s human capital development index.

The remarks were made during NBS TV's Spotlight where a number of strategies were outlined to improve the country's education system.

The director Basic and Secondary Education at the ministry of Education and Sports, Ismael Mulindwa, said with the policy in place, the liberalisation of education will be regulated and streamlined.

Mulindwa urged the public to join hands to ensure that children have access to quality education adding that this is a shared responsibility.

"We have mechanisms by which we regulate fees. We are very clear about fees when sending guidelines to schools. We have over time realised that there is something that needs to be fixed [regarding fees],"he stated.

On the issue regarding the effect of Covid-19 on school going girls, Mulindwa said as a ministry, they knew they would have some students who would fall pregnant during pandemic.

"We provided guidelines to guide the schools and students on how they could go about this. We agreed as a ministry, to give a second chance to girls who were pregnant to go back to school. This shouldn't be seen as us supporting teenage pregnancy,"he explained.

The Permanent Secretary in the ministry of Education and Sports, Alex Kakooza said that the ministry plans to open more schools and facilities for learners with special needs.

"We have children with special needs and these children must be catered for. We have come up with an inclusive policy to provide for all learners, especially those with special needs,"he said.

Kakooza said that the ministry is professionalising teaching in this country adding that they want all teachers  to be professional.

"When we implement our teacher policy, teachers will specialise and they can have any qualification up to Ph.D. at any level of education. With the arrival of private schools, most of these traditional schools lost learners and teachers to the private schools," he noted.

He said that they will ensure that each parish has at least one government-aided secondary school and infrastructure to bring schools closer to the learners.