School Inspection

UJCC through the Ecumenical Education Teams (EETs) conducts school supervisions. The Ecumenical Education Teams who are from the UJCC member churches have a professional background in Education.

With the guidance of a performance evaluation form, the EETs inspect schools to access the status of schools in terms of children enrollment, the school environment, school drop outs, Teacher to student’s ratio, teacher attendance in schools among other. The findings from the exercise of School Inspection dictate the form of advocacy to be taken on in the Education programme.

Legislative advocacy in Education Laws

UJCC has engagements with the Ministry of Education and Sports and Parliament with the Social services committee on policies, programmes and laws pertaining to Education. UJCC was at the forefront in the advocacy of the Education Bill that was passed in April 2008. A number of recommendations presented in a Memorandum to the Social services committee of Parliament on the Bill were incorporated into the Bill.

Advocacy on Education through Networks

UJCC through her numerous networks, is at the forefront in advocating for issues pertaining to Education. Through these networks she has engagements with the Ministry of Education and Sports. Among the Education issues handled include: Education Management Information Systems (EMIS) which facilitates the elimination of ghost teachers but also keep account of the numbers of registered primary school pupils and schoolsinplacemaking it easy to record large numbers of pupils and track their examination results, and also indicate where there is increased staff enrollment in primary schools, or where there is need to conduct recruitment of secondary school teachers according to subjects or the schools that need decentralization; and on the government policy of grading of Private secondary schools.

Enhancing Social Responsibility in the Education Sector programme

With the aim of improving the provision of quality Education in schools, the programme introduced a number of initiatives geared at creating awareness on the community’s roles and responsibilities in the promotion of quality Education. This is done through equipping knowledge and skills on a number of issues among which; access, enrolment and retention in schools, transparency and accountability in the provision of basic quality education in schools; the roles and responsibilities of school management committees, monitoring of Education programmes within the Districts, the roles and responsibilities of different stakeholder as stipulated in the Education Act who are; School management committees, Head Teachers, Chairpersons, Councilors, sub county chiefs, chairpersons of Parents and Teacher Associations, and Religious leaders.

Under the Enhancing Social Responsibility in the Education Sector programme implemented in the six project Districts of Tororo, Namutumba, Ssembabule, Hoima, Masindi and Kibaale, success stories were registered. Initiatives addressing the inadequate access to quality basic education were introduced which saw the capacity of the Church, School Management Committees (SMCs), Parents and guardians built to make meaningful contribution in handling enormous challenges faced in the promotion of quality education. The community has taken on its own initiative of Schools being monitored by the community, parents and guardian, and this has checked teacher absenteeism and it has also boosted pupil retention in schools.