While I am sure Costco has
been displaying Christmas décor for months and the house on Devonshire Drive is well
underway transforming itself to a winter wonderland, current life in the UG is
made up of one thing…
Exams.
Not so wonderful.
It is difficult to explain
through a blog how the school system works in Uganda.
Students pay a lot of
money for their education. If they don’t,
you often find the school has little to investment in their development and
success.
Those that can afford
often find the schools plagued by systemic problems such as extreme
overcrowding, lack of textbooks and other educational resources, and teacher
absenteeism.
It is modeled on an
outdated British colonial system that stresses rote memorization of facts and
focuses no attention on creativity, imagination, and critical thinking.
Simply put, school is
broken into the following levels…
Primary, levels one to
seven.
Secondary, levels one to
four, considered ordinary level.
Secondary, levels five and
six, considered advanced level.
This excludes all higher
education.
Students at the above
levels attend school for an upwards of 12 hours a day, with a 30-minute break
and a one hour lunch, which many of the students spend walking home to get some
posho and beans.
Throughout a Ugandan
child’s 11 to 13 year education, there are two big exams in which they are
heavily prepped for. In primary 7 they take
their PLE: Primary Leaving Examinations and at secondary four student take
their UCE: Uganda Certificate of Education.
These comprehensive exams essentially determine their placement for
secondary school and whether or not they can continue to advanced level.
Fact. If a student does not perform well in their
UCE, their future options are limited to attending a vocational school to
acquire a specific skill, such as carpentry or tailoring, or to attend a
Primary Teacher’s College to become a primary school teacher.
For the rest of the
students in school, they also have exams.
Even those in baby class, equivalent to preschool.
People. I am serious.
They have written and oral
exams about colors, the alphabet, basic anatomy, and manners.
Many of my youth are in
the midst of preparing, revising, and studying.
To play my part in
supporting them, Miss Matthews is tutoring and slowly having to remember the
basics of geometry. It is much more
complicated than I remember.
Especially since
schoolchildren do not receive textbooks and instead write it all down in their
notebooks.
One of my girls, Rachel,
who is in secondary one, shared with me her examination schedule.
Hold on to your hats
folks.
Taking place over nine
days, Rachel will take a total of 17 exams.
And you thought that
one-week of finals was tough.
The topics?
CRE: Christian Religious
Education, IRE: Islamic Religious Education, English
Mathematics, Chemistry, Physics,
Biology, History, Geography, Entrepreneurship, Finance, Commerce, Agriculture,
Computers, French, Luganda, and Kiswahili.
2 religion classes.
3 science based classes.
3 business themed classes.
3 language classes,
excluding English, none of which are considered the national language.
The total number of exams
that the average student will complete in his or her secondary level education
amounts to almost double what an American student will take from their freshman
year of high school to their senior year in college.
Just some food for thought
when you are cramming for that next exam.
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