USAID / Uganda - Success Stories

In the 1960s, Uganda had one of the best education systems in Africa. However, the political upheavals and economic mismanagement of the 1970s and early 1980s wreaked havoc on the education sector. Infrastructure was destroyed, materials were not available, and resources were diverted. Teachers were poorly trained or not trained at all and had neither career prospects nor incentives. Many had left the teaching profession and joined the private sector. Teachers in the rural areas moved to urban centers in search of better pay. School management was left in the hands of head teachers, who lacked management skills. The teacher-training curriculum was outdated, and many school-aged children were out of school.

When relative stability returned to Uganda in the late 1980s, revitalization of the education sector became a priority. With a conducive policy environment and political will from the government, reform focused on examination and curriculum, textbook supply, financial resource flows, and, most importantly, teacher recruitment, training and retention.

USAID/Uganda has been a leading partner in primary education reform in Uganda, and a central part of USAID's program is support to the Teacher Development and Management System(TDMS). TDMS is an innovative program for quality enhancement in the primary education sector. The TDMS strategy has decentralized teacher-training activities from the traditional pre-service fixed-site primary teacher's colleges (PTC) to the peri-urban and rural villages. Central to TDMS are the coordinating center tutors (CCT). Currently, there are 549 tutors nationally in the 56 districts. Tutors are "teacher-roving trainers" in that they are responsible for the support of a cluster of schools in their respective catchement areas. On average, tutors work with 20-25 primary schools. In addition to training the teachers, USAID funds were used to establish 549 learning resource centers throughout the country. The teachers are now using these centers to meet with their tutors and for developing teaching aids using locally available materials.

In addition to supporting the professional development of classroom teachers, TDMS has also enhanced the management, leadership, and oversight skills of over 20,000 head teachers and school inspectors. Community mobilization training sessions, involving parents and community leaders, have enabled parents, students and community members as well as teachers to better understand why basic education is important for both girls and boys and how they can help their children achieve.

USAID support has upgraded the teaching skills and improved the classroom performance of almost 100,000 primary school teachers, head teachers, and inspectors. Both class performance and individual performance on national examinations have begun to improve, according to the most recent Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) results. In addition, attrition among teachers has decreased and teachers are finding the teaching profession attractive again.

One beneficiary said: "I am a mother with four children, and I cannot manage the fees for pre-service. Now, I am in my last year here in the PTC, after three long years of work. Sometimes I was thinking I cannot make it but my CCT would encourage me. I find math hard but I can make it to pass. I am even bringing my one-year-old to PTC residentials so my big girl is the babysitter as I read. I think TDMS is the best for those of us from deep in the village who cannot afford other ways."

USAID/ Uganda - Success Stories