Uganda: The Importance of an Inclusive Education

Special Needs Education in Uganda: The Salamanca Statement highlights the importance of special needs education to the Ugandan government. This blog post will look at how one person with Down's syndrome could have been helped by an inclusive education. It will also highlight some of the problems special needs education faces to become inclusive.

In a profile for a 2016 interview for The Innovative Science & Technology Group Christa Preston, Executive Director of embraceKulture described her varied career consulting for multibillion dollar companies in Silicon valley. Using that experience she is working on innovative solutions to alleviate poverty and improve education in Uganda. In an interview, SISTEM one-on-one with Ms. Christa Preston, Executive Director of embraceKulture: Education for children with disabilities in Uganda, Ms Preston describes the inspiration that lead her to found embraceKulture:

When I met Oliva, she was 17. She spoke three languages and loved cooking. She wanted to work in a restaurant and own a house with a room for her mother. If she had been born in America, she would be in college now or working at a restaurant and living independently. But she wasn't. She was born in Uganda, a country where her down syndrome defined her and labeled her a curse.

Oliva, like 99% of girls like her, cannot read. Most believed she was incapable of learning and did not push to teach her. She, like 94% of children like her, has dropped out of primary school. She, like 2.5 million children like her, has been labeled a "curse" and, without skills, would be forced to rely on a society that has rejected her.

However, despite not having access to therapy and specialized services like counterparts in the US, Oliva and children like her have developed a high level of independence, driven perhaps by necessity.

Oliva lived most of her life at a boarding school with one caretaker for over 40 children. As a result she learned to cook for herself, do laundry, care for her friends and herself. On the playground, the levels of friendship and peer teaching I saw from the students often shocked me.

In addition, the economy in Uganda is driven by manual skills such as agriculture. While Oliva struggled with reading she readily developed the skills for cooking. The hands on nature of cooking helped her achieve mathematic milestones as well.

By developing skills that allow her to be a contributing member of her community Oliva is able to combat the negative stigma she faces and prove disability is not inability. With support from her village Oliva would be able to own her own home and, with her family, perhaps even a business.

This personal experience helps underline the importance of education for everyone and further stresses the need for inclusive education in Uganda. There are challenges to getting an inclusive education if you have special needs. Christa Preston summarizes the 3 most important challenges for children with special needs:

1. Lack of trained teachers: With only two Universities offering degrees in special needs education there are not enough teachers currently in the field or entering the field to meet the unique needs of learners.
2. Lack of resources/accessibility including classroom resources and curriculum adaptions: As described above, to date there has been inadequate resource allocation to address the needs of these students. Classrooms are often equipped with only chalkboard, chalk, pencil and paper. Visuals are rare as well as manipulatives. Furthermore, teachers are unable to adapt curriculums to meet the needs of learners.
3. Societal Stigma: Children with disabilities are still often seen as a curse. The vast majority of these children are not in school. Sensitization/outreach efforts have been effective in convincing parents of the need to place all children in school. Unfortunately, due to the above children with disabilities often brought home failing grades and parents were quick to remove them from school.

Inclusive Education

The following article from April 2016 article, Special Needs Education budget increased by 34.4%, discusses the Ugandan government's policy and financial commitment to inclusive education:

The budget for the special needs education (SNE), guidance and counseling has been increased to 34.4% during the financial year 2016/2017.

This was revealed by David Walakira, Civil Society Budget Advocacy Group (CSBAG) budget policy specialist during the strategic breakfast meeting on financing for Persons with special needs for the financial year 2016/17 held at Golf Course in Kampala on Monday.

The increment is as a result of analysis of the ministerial policy statement FY 2016/2017. In FY 2015/16, SNE, guidance and counseling were allocated sh1,017,124,000, while in FY 2016/17, has been increased to sh1,367,124,000, an increment of 34.4%

"The funds shall be allocated for different development projects including; providing technical guidance in regards to SNE, offer special equipment to scholars in SNE, monitor activities in SNE and monitoring of policy formulation for matters relating to SNE," he said.

"Though the money is not sufficient to cater for the needs of persons with special needs, how much SNE needs requires an assessment of current number of persons with disabilities, those in school and other areas” he added.

The meeting organized by CSBAG was attended by Members of Parliament on the health, education and gender committees aimed at discussing areas of concern for persons with disability that need more attention.

Among the crucial things discussed include; drop in the number of teachers trained to teach leaners with special needs at Kyambogo University due to limited funding from government, lack of friendly beds for expectant mothers with disability in hospitals, high cost of orthopedic tools and devices like wheel chairs which some PMs said are expensive (sh500,000) and most Ugandans cannot afford.

Woman Member of Parliament elect, Koboko district, Margaret Baba Diri who is also visually impaired noted with concern that teachers of learners with disability are few and overworked, are paid the same salary like their counterparts who teach learners with no disability, which has demoralized them thus running to schools that pay them better.

"Teaching persons with disability is very difficult especially the blind and mental retarded. Mentally retarded learners are taught one thing at a time repeatedly, while the while for the visual impaired, learn by description until they all understand. You pity a teacher who has to teach such children in all the seven classes. This is work overload, tiresome, yet they are paid the same salary as their counterparts," said Diri.

"Government needs to urgently give incentives to teachers of learners with special needs to motivate them to stay in schools where they are attached. This can be 10% increment of their salary to avoid losing such teachers to schools where they are paid more” she added.

Dorothy Nshaija, MP Kamwenge district said though the proposal to give incentives to teachers of learners with disability is well intentioned to motivate them, the move could be expensive for the country.

She explained that if the incentive is put in place, non-beneficiaries may abandon the teaching to the beneficiaries, or every teacher may opt to undergo basic training to start teaching learners with special needs to get the money.

Nshaija said government can put in place a program in which all teachers are trained to teach learners with special needs so that there is no section of teachers who are at the same level earning more than the others or over strained.

This article above identifies 3 problems: 

1. Teaching children with special needs requires extra skills for which teachers are not paid. 
2. The special needs budget described as "a paltry 0.12% of the entire education budget" in an article in the blog post Special Needs Education in Uganda: The Salamanca Statement has increased by 34%. Special needs education is obviously underfunded. 
3. Without proper information about the number of disabled the Government is unable to make plans. This blog Shows that data and statistics exist, the research often does not exist.

To further inclusive education these problems need to be resolved. The topic of special education is loaded with stigma and prejudice is it any wonder there is reluctance to provide full funding.

In summary, despite the Ugandan Government's commitment to special needs education there is still a lack of resources. As this blog has shown time and again, societal stigma and prejudice holds back progress. Disability is about so much more than facing physical barriers, for those with down's syndrome for instance, it is not physical barriers, but the stigma of the disability that holds back the progress and development of many useful members of Ugandan society. The stigmatization of CWDs is preventing CWDs from making a useful contribution to the Ugandan economy and society.