KATAKWI, UGANDA: Authorities in Katakwi district, eastern Uganda say the district is currently affected by a lack of ICT equipment at their education centres causing less competition with other regions.
This was raised during the presser supported by ActionAid International Uganda at Amoruongora primary school in Palam Sub County in Katakwi district during the belated celebrations of the Day of African Child.
In his deliberations, the RDC katakwi District maj. Godfrey Even Katamba said that most primary schools in his Katakwi District do not have ICT equipment like computers and the Internet, among others causing the learners to lag behind.
Katamba added that a few schools like Kokorio primary school with a population of over 1600 have only one ICT teacher with one computer system.
This is a problem which will not allow our learners to do research as the new curriculum states.
Meanwhile, the district LCV Katakwi Geofrey Omolo during a presser said these problems are caused by low funding to the lower local governments from the centre.
Omolo added that another thing affecting his district is the issue of the wage where the Ministry of Public Service bared recruitment of new employees to the civil service.
Katakwi being a hard-to-reach district in Eastern Uganda, and even network services from network service providers are not reliable which causes research a tough solution to save the education system in the district.
He loaded that, his district is short of over 400 teachers who sometimes could be helping learners with research and other activities in the new curriculum which is calling for research as one of the key aspects of learners to participate in schools.
Omolo called for increased funding towards the education sector so that ICT equipment can be rolled to every school with the aim of not leaving any learner behind.
Electricity is also one of the challenges my district is facing since it is only on the roadside but can’t be accessed at schools like Obwobwo primary school in Ongongoja sub-county, Akisim BT Primary School in Ngariam or Eve Angerepo primary schools where some of the learners have never seen electricity poles.
On this matter, the RDC Katakwi Maj. Godfrey Even Katamba told DailyExpress that, there was a recent mapping by the Ministry of Energy under the Rural electrification program which was conducted at the entire district to light up government institutions like schools, health centres, and lower local administrative units among others.
Katamba said this program will be effected from July to August when by he calls upon those schools to prepare for the digital migration.
Patrick Olila the Chief Administrative officer for Katakwi however confirmed that his district will start recruitment of teachers next financial year though the recent recruitment flopped due to administrative issues.
Olila added that, if this is done, the issue of ICT will be major and Katakwi as a district is ready to migrate to a digital world.
Katamba confirmed that, in each seed school in Katakwi, there is an ICT lab, with this kind of development, ICT challenges will die a natural death in Katakwi since there are more seed schools to be constructed in the district in the sub-counties of Okore, Getom, Toroma among others.
Katakwi District has over eighty-four primary schools with only one ICT teacher.
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