Friday, December 11, 2015
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Tell Us Best Exam Performers: Open Letter to UNEB
In 2007, the Executive Secretary of UNEB, Mr. Matthew Bukenya, announced that the Board would no longer disclose the best performers in its examinations—explaining that such disclosure encourages unhealthy competition and, consequently, examination malpractice.
At the time, I wrote explaining that this would conceal laziness, ineffective approaches to instruction and disparities in education; and deny students/parents the information they need to select the best schools (Sunday Monitor 28th/1/2007, p.28).
Regardless, UNEB does not tell the public the best performers in its examinations. Unsurprisingly, the media does. Following the release of the results from the PLE examinations of 2010 on Friday 21st January 2011, for example, Saturday Vision, Saturday Monitor and Bukedde Lwamukaaga ran the headlines “Best and worst PLE schools: ranking of 10,000 primary schools’ performance”, “PLE best performers” and “Best 1,000 schools” respectively (on Saturday 22nd/1/2010).
Though the newspapers should be commended for filling the information gap created by UNEB, there are notable problems with the information that they supply.
First, the criterion they use to compare schools’ performance is plainly invalid. At primary and ordinary levels, the best schools are taken to be those with the highest number of students passing in Division 1 while at the Advanced level they are those with the highest number of students admitted to higher education institutions. This is misleading. Going by this criterion, for example, Bukedde Lwamukaaga ranked Mpererwe Primary School, which had 54 out of 258 candidates pass in Division 1 better than Aga Khan Primary, which had 42 out of 60 students pass in Division 1! Even if Saturday Vision ranked the number of students passing in Division 1 as a percentage of the total number of students from the school, it gives an erroneous impression that 2nd and 3rd Divisions don’t bear on schools’ performance. Consequently, the paper ranked 5752 schools as being in the same position—because none of them had a student in Division 1—so one wonders how a student/parent can use the ranking to select one school over others.
Regarding students, no method is identifiable. It seems the students reported as ‘best’ are not published on the basis of their grades but the odds they defied to put up whatever performance they put up or prominence of their parents/schools.
Third, the newspapers’ motivation for publishing the ‘best’ schools and students are suspicious. In Bukedde Lwamukaaga, for example, Vule (aggregate 7) and Nabaasa (aggregate 5) attributed their success to reading Pass PLE—a publication of Bukedde.
Accordingly, the information that the papers provide may not guide students/parents to the best schools. Rather, it may mislead them to poorly performing schools but which know how to teach many students but sieve out those that may not achieve Division 1, so that they record 100 percent division 1; steal students that are hoped to put up exceptional performance, and be reported in the media, from the schools that groomed them; neglect majority of their students and give a few promising students top notch support so that they make it to the best students’ pages; or publish edited versions of their performance, showing only those students that scored good grades. Notwithstanding, the media, and schools, have a right to report examination performance as they think fit. However, the pubic counts on UNEB to provide official information on schools’ performance, against which it can judge the authenticity of information from other sources. But UNEB does not provide this information. Why?
At the time, I wrote explaining that this would conceal laziness, ineffective approaches to instruction and disparities in education; and deny students/parents the information they need to select the best schools (Sunday Monitor 28th/1/2007, p.28).
Regardless, UNEB does not tell the public the best performers in its examinations. Unsurprisingly, the media does. Following the release of the results from the PLE examinations of 2010 on Friday 21st January 2011, for example, Saturday Vision, Saturday Monitor and Bukedde Lwamukaaga ran the headlines “Best and worst PLE schools: ranking of 10,000 primary schools’ performance”, “PLE best performers” and “Best 1,000 schools” respectively (on Saturday 22nd/1/2010).
Though the newspapers should be commended for filling the information gap created by UNEB, there are notable problems with the information that they supply.
First, the criterion they use to compare schools’ performance is plainly invalid. At primary and ordinary levels, the best schools are taken to be those with the highest number of students passing in Division 1 while at the Advanced level they are those with the highest number of students admitted to higher education institutions. This is misleading. Going by this criterion, for example, Bukedde Lwamukaaga ranked Mpererwe Primary School, which had 54 out of 258 candidates pass in Division 1 better than Aga Khan Primary, which had 42 out of 60 students pass in Division 1! Even if Saturday Vision ranked the number of students passing in Division 1 as a percentage of the total number of students from the school, it gives an erroneous impression that 2nd and 3rd Divisions don’t bear on schools’ performance. Consequently, the paper ranked 5752 schools as being in the same position—because none of them had a student in Division 1—so one wonders how a student/parent can use the ranking to select one school over others.
Regarding students, no method is identifiable. It seems the students reported as ‘best’ are not published on the basis of their grades but the odds they defied to put up whatever performance they put up or prominence of their parents/schools.
Third, the newspapers’ motivation for publishing the ‘best’ schools and students are suspicious. In Bukedde Lwamukaaga, for example, Vule (aggregate 7) and Nabaasa (aggregate 5) attributed their success to reading Pass PLE—a publication of Bukedde.
Accordingly, the information that the papers provide may not guide students/parents to the best schools. Rather, it may mislead them to poorly performing schools but which know how to teach many students but sieve out those that may not achieve Division 1, so that they record 100 percent division 1; steal students that are hoped to put up exceptional performance, and be reported in the media, from the schools that groomed them; neglect majority of their students and give a few promising students top notch support so that they make it to the best students’ pages; or publish edited versions of their performance, showing only those students that scored good grades. Notwithstanding, the media, and schools, have a right to report examination performance as they think fit. However, the pubic counts on UNEB to provide official information on schools’ performance, against which it can judge the authenticity of information from other sources. But UNEB does not provide this information. Why?
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Pregnant Students Need Support; Not Condemnation
Jude Ssempebwa
Recent media reports indicate that the Ministry of Education is reviewing the policy on (primary and secondary school) students that get pregnant during the course of their studies (The New Vision, Monday November 10, 2008). According to the Minister, Honorable Namirembe Bitamazire, the goal of the review is to introduce more stringent measures that will deny these students examinations, because they inconvenience the schools and allowing them to sit for their (final) examinations is unhealthy and sets a bad precedent for the younger girls. For a number of reasons, such cursory views have been commonly expressed, albeit by uncritical, and usually moralistic, commentators. Now that they are informing policy review, however, it is well deserved that the reviewers of the policy are brought to understand that these students need support not condemnation.
Contrary to the Minister’s argument, students that get pregnant during the course of their studies are not necessarily immoral; many of them are victims of rape and defilement, sometimes by teachers and parents that they (understandably) cannot disclose. Secondly, pregnant students do not necessarily give their peers a bad example, since many of the peers are already involved in fornication only that they have not yet been found pregnant. Besides, we now have highly varied categories of students, including adults that are in marriage or cohabitation and who have both the unalienable right to produce children and to education under articles 31 and 30 of the constitution respectively. Even though the Minister argues that school is meant for studying and not producing children, attainment of Education for All necessitates the accommodation of students from all walks of life, including those that ostensibly inconvenience the school system.
Those in favor of expelling pregnant students from the school system focus on worsening the plight of the students, to deter other students from getting pregnant. Consequently the educational, and often professional, future of the students is deliberately blurred. Fearing such condemnation, many girls that find themselves pregnant resort to (unsafe) abortion. Rather than focus on blurring the future of pregnant students, therefore, the Ministry, and other policy makers, should focus on why students get pregnant during the course of their studies as a basis for the generation of solutions.
Adult students get pregnant during the course of their studies because it is fine for them to do so while juveniles do so as a consequence of abuse or consensual fornication involvement. Rather than treat all the categories of students as deserving to be rejected, therefore, the Ministry should consider interventions that are suited to support each category depending on the peculiarity of their needs. For adult students, pregnancy during the course of studying should be unconditionally accepted and, if need be, facilities or special schools to allow for their seclusion from other students in cases where they could inconvenience them developed. Such facilities could also accommodate juveniles that get pregnant during the course of their studies. In any case, however, there will not be need for training teachers in midwifery as is feared by the Minister since schools already have doctors and/or nurses. On the other hand, the prevention of sexual abuse, through empowering girls with life skills and apprehending the abusers would resolve the problem of student pregnancies better than the elimination of the victims of such abuse from the school system. Finally, overriding attention should be placed, not on threatening girls with expulsion from schools, but addressing the factors that have motivated and supported consensual fornication involvement including the general lack of quality sex education in many schools and homes.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
LET MAKERERE INCREASE FEES
Once again, government has blocked Makerere University from implementing fees increments, proposed following expert advice. Earlier, the Minister for Higher Education cited CHOGM, explaining that government is unlikely to support fees increments before the event. Then, in his letter directing the university not to increase fees, he queries the manner in which the decision to increase fees was reached (The New vision, 9th June, 2007).
Ulterior Fears
The Minister betrays an ulterior fear of the proposed increments or, at the least, a condoning of Makerere’s under funding. To start off, one wonders how CHOGM can be cited against increasing fees for privately sponsored students. Secondly, in querying the finance committee’s capacity to increase fees, the Minister ignores article 42 (2) of the Universities and Other Tertiary Institutions Act, which provides for this capacity. Thirdly, while article 40 (b) of the act states that the council shall…fix scales of fees, the Minister is at pains to distinguish between the fixing of scales of fees and the raising of fees, forgetting that raising is also fixing. Fourthly, the minister forgets that the university is not under obligation to delay its decisions until the president has studied visitation reports.
Understanding the refusal of fees rises
The truth is that government fears for the affordability of the increased fees, and likely student action. Nonetheless, we should accept that quality comes with costs and that, as long as we aspire to it, the question of whether to increase fees is irrelevant and decisions to increase fees must be implemented without delay. Rather, attention should be on whether, and how, students can afford increased fees, to which I now turn.
Irony of Makerere Fees
As to whether students can afford increasing fees has already been answered. In a 2004 study, for instance, I found that 80% of the schools that qualified over 70% of the students admitted to Makerere in the 2003/2004 academic year were charging higher fees than those levied in the university’s most populated school and faculties—Education, Arts, Science and Social Sciences—which is corroborated by the McGregor committee. Yet, ironically, there are fears that increasing Makerere’s fees will prohibit access.
Affording the increased fees
No doubt, increased fees could be beyond the means of some students and attract student resistance. Nonetheless, this resistance would be consequent upon inability to pay, and perceived unsuitability, of the increments. Hence, government should focus, not on resisting the proposed increments per se, but on ensuring that they are reasonable and that ways through which they can be met are devised, which could be done through:
Streamlining Resources Utilisation
Crucial to the perceived suitability of fees increments, is the efficiency with which resources are utilised. So far, the McGregor committee has reported resources mismanagement. On top of bringing the motivation for increasing fees to question, this could create an illusion that big increments are necessitated when, in fact, they are not. If the proposed increments are necessitated to procure teaching resources rather than feed the university’s 66 indefensible allowances, and which government can determine, therefore, they should be implemented.
Revision of Government Sponsorship
After increasing fees in line with costs, a means of ensuring their affordability is the extension of governmental funding to their subsidisation, rather than restricting it to a select few. With the cost incurred by each student reduced thus, many would afford a realistically priced university education. These are the policy issues on which Makerere cannot decide, and which government should direct; not the raising of fees as the Minister suggests.
Deferred payment
Underlying the fear that increased fees are likely to be unaffordable is the appropriation of the cost of students’ education to a few payers (government and parents). A way out, therefore, is the shifting of the cost to the students, thorough the institution of loan schemes, which could ensure that each payer incurs but a small fraction of the big cost. The dynamics of operating these schemes may best be worked out by financial institutions that are cognisant of pertinent variables. In many settings where these schemes are operational, however, their institution is capitalised by government, social security funds and similar organisations, meaning that, even here, government has a role to play.
Ulterior Fears
The Minister betrays an ulterior fear of the proposed increments or, at the least, a condoning of Makerere’s under funding. To start off, one wonders how CHOGM can be cited against increasing fees for privately sponsored students. Secondly, in querying the finance committee’s capacity to increase fees, the Minister ignores article 42 (2) of the Universities and Other Tertiary Institutions Act, which provides for this capacity. Thirdly, while article 40 (b) of the act states that the council shall…fix scales of fees, the Minister is at pains to distinguish between the fixing of scales of fees and the raising of fees, forgetting that raising is also fixing. Fourthly, the minister forgets that the university is not under obligation to delay its decisions until the president has studied visitation reports.
Understanding the refusal of fees rises
The truth is that government fears for the affordability of the increased fees, and likely student action. Nonetheless, we should accept that quality comes with costs and that, as long as we aspire to it, the question of whether to increase fees is irrelevant and decisions to increase fees must be implemented without delay. Rather, attention should be on whether, and how, students can afford increased fees, to which I now turn.
Irony of Makerere Fees
As to whether students can afford increasing fees has already been answered. In a 2004 study, for instance, I found that 80% of the schools that qualified over 70% of the students admitted to Makerere in the 2003/2004 academic year were charging higher fees than those levied in the university’s most populated school and faculties—Education, Arts, Science and Social Sciences—which is corroborated by the McGregor committee. Yet, ironically, there are fears that increasing Makerere’s fees will prohibit access.
Affording the increased fees
No doubt, increased fees could be beyond the means of some students and attract student resistance. Nonetheless, this resistance would be consequent upon inability to pay, and perceived unsuitability, of the increments. Hence, government should focus, not on resisting the proposed increments per se, but on ensuring that they are reasonable and that ways through which they can be met are devised, which could be done through:
Streamlining Resources Utilisation
Crucial to the perceived suitability of fees increments, is the efficiency with which resources are utilised. So far, the McGregor committee has reported resources mismanagement. On top of bringing the motivation for increasing fees to question, this could create an illusion that big increments are necessitated when, in fact, they are not. If the proposed increments are necessitated to procure teaching resources rather than feed the university’s 66 indefensible allowances, and which government can determine, therefore, they should be implemented.
Revision of Government Sponsorship
After increasing fees in line with costs, a means of ensuring their affordability is the extension of governmental funding to their subsidisation, rather than restricting it to a select few. With the cost incurred by each student reduced thus, many would afford a realistically priced university education. These are the policy issues on which Makerere cannot decide, and which government should direct; not the raising of fees as the Minister suggests.
Deferred payment
Underlying the fear that increased fees are likely to be unaffordable is the appropriation of the cost of students’ education to a few payers (government and parents). A way out, therefore, is the shifting of the cost to the students, thorough the institution of loan schemes, which could ensure that each payer incurs but a small fraction of the big cost. The dynamics of operating these schemes may best be worked out by financial institutions that are cognisant of pertinent variables. In many settings where these schemes are operational, however, their institution is capitalised by government, social security funds and similar organisations, meaning that, even here, government has a role to play.
Ban on Student Caning? What a Joke
The Ministry of Education finally came out to illegalise the canning of students, apparently consequent upon the beatings in Katikamu and Arua that went sour as was reported in the press. It interesting to note, however, that this is just another of many such directives from the same ministry and that like all the previous, the latest will not work as I will illustrate shortly. Firstly, however, I will critique the incident that alarmed the Ministry of Education to re-illegalise student canning.
Students are Cunning
I did not take the story in which five students were reportedly beaten by three teachers into comma seriously until the Ministry of Education based itself on it to re-state its directive against caning. I took it for granted that everyone readily discerned that it was a tale of a comedy. I have since learnt better, which is why I will draw an analogy between that and a similar story albeit the later ended differently.
For two years, a classmate of mine convinced our teachers that even half the stroke of a cane on him was enough to throw him into comma and teachers who were weak at learning (or remembering) his vulnerability were often sent into panic because he readily collapsed into comma as soon as a rod was tried on him. On one such occasion, he was so badly in comma that as soon as he was admitted at a nearby hospital, Sister Headmistress contacted the father who, on arrival, called the boy — who was on drip — to life. And when they returned to school, the father demonstrated — at an impromptu school assembly — that the boy can be clobbered beyond limits the school had ever considered reaching. This marked the end of the commas even though he succumbed to thorough caning thereafter. What a shame that a whole Ministry of Education believed that three teachers, probably consulting among themselves, flogged students into comma one by one until the fifth!
Caning Popular; Teachers at Crossroads
The Ministry of Education specifies the don’ts without specifying the dos so teachers are at crossroads. For starters, we in the classrooms are mostly dealing with kids and adolescents. They demand more freedom than is reasonably acceptable; would like to disobey authority; and can be incredibly irrational. So what do you do? When you reprimand them, they laugh it off. For many students, suspension from class — to go home or dig up anthills in the school farm — is a God sent break from dreaded lessons. Besides, suspensions mean missed lessons so you are sure to register failures. Ironically, the Ministry turns its eyes away from this reality and bans caning without specifying equally effective alternatives.
Interestingly, many head teachers and parents, including legislators and officers of the Ministry of Education, appreciate Proverbs 13:24. Subsequently, at many staff and parents’ meetings, teachers receive orders to “beat them” from the horse’s mouth. So what do you do when you are at obligation to produce results so as to keep your job? Of course consider that caning ensures compliance whilst saving lesson time and effecting a positive ripple effect — until some students convince journalists that it has thrown them into commas albeit cunningly.
Ill Considered Bandwagon
It is quite apparent that anti-caning advocacy is subsequent upon a wave of child rights activism that is seemingly followed with little consideration for our own context. What it is to be punished, for example, is largely a sociological construct that children acquire as they socialise with seniors starting with their parents. And because many of the parents trust the rod, when children are handed over to teachers, they don’t feel punished until the cane has been administered. That is precisely why I am yet to believe that our students can attain the grades their parents, school authorities and they themselves want to see when we withdraw the threat of the rod. I, however, know graduates who are now glad that their teachers caned them.
Students are Cunning
I did not take the story in which five students were reportedly beaten by three teachers into comma seriously until the Ministry of Education based itself on it to re-state its directive against caning. I took it for granted that everyone readily discerned that it was a tale of a comedy. I have since learnt better, which is why I will draw an analogy between that and a similar story albeit the later ended differently.
For two years, a classmate of mine convinced our teachers that even half the stroke of a cane on him was enough to throw him into comma and teachers who were weak at learning (or remembering) his vulnerability were often sent into panic because he readily collapsed into comma as soon as a rod was tried on him. On one such occasion, he was so badly in comma that as soon as he was admitted at a nearby hospital, Sister Headmistress contacted the father who, on arrival, called the boy — who was on drip — to life. And when they returned to school, the father demonstrated — at an impromptu school assembly — that the boy can be clobbered beyond limits the school had ever considered reaching. This marked the end of the commas even though he succumbed to thorough caning thereafter. What a shame that a whole Ministry of Education believed that three teachers, probably consulting among themselves, flogged students into comma one by one until the fifth!
Caning Popular; Teachers at Crossroads
The Ministry of Education specifies the don’ts without specifying the dos so teachers are at crossroads. For starters, we in the classrooms are mostly dealing with kids and adolescents. They demand more freedom than is reasonably acceptable; would like to disobey authority; and can be incredibly irrational. So what do you do? When you reprimand them, they laugh it off. For many students, suspension from class — to go home or dig up anthills in the school farm — is a God sent break from dreaded lessons. Besides, suspensions mean missed lessons so you are sure to register failures. Ironically, the Ministry turns its eyes away from this reality and bans caning without specifying equally effective alternatives.
Interestingly, many head teachers and parents, including legislators and officers of the Ministry of Education, appreciate Proverbs 13:24. Subsequently, at many staff and parents’ meetings, teachers receive orders to “beat them” from the horse’s mouth. So what do you do when you are at obligation to produce results so as to keep your job? Of course consider that caning ensures compliance whilst saving lesson time and effecting a positive ripple effect — until some students convince journalists that it has thrown them into commas albeit cunningly.
Ill Considered Bandwagon
It is quite apparent that anti-caning advocacy is subsequent upon a wave of child rights activism that is seemingly followed with little consideration for our own context. What it is to be punished, for example, is largely a sociological construct that children acquire as they socialise with seniors starting with their parents. And because many of the parents trust the rod, when children are handed over to teachers, they don’t feel punished until the cane has been administered. That is precisely why I am yet to believe that our students can attain the grades their parents, school authorities and they themselves want to see when we withdraw the threat of the rod. I, however, know graduates who are now glad that their teachers caned them.
Friday, June 1, 2007
Educational Planning: Principles, Tools and Applications in the Developing World
AUTHOR: J. C. S. Musaazi
ISBN: 9970-05-022-2
PUBLISHER: Makerere University Press
AVAILABLE AT: East African Institute of Higher Education Studies and Development
ISBN: 9970-05-022-2
PUBLISHER: Makerere University Press
AVAILABLE AT: East African Institute of Higher Education Studies and Development
Makerere University
Review by Jude Ssempebwa
Hailing from the hands of the renowned author of ‘The theory and practice of educational administration’, ‘Educational Planning: Principles, Tools and Applications in the Developing World’ is a masterpiece that brings together the breadth and depth of planning in a uniquely simple and captivating style. Treating planning from the viewpoint of developing world education, it explores a wide range of issues, stretching from education through politics to development, which it analyses, whilst drawing lessons for the developing from the developed world, within a standardised paradigm. Pertinent theoretical aspects of planning as well as micro and macro planning models are discussed and a laudable attempt is made on defining a generic model. Above all, it is prescriptive, so readers will not only learn planning and why it is often erratic; they will learn how to plan, in educational and other settings, at all levels. Lastly, its futuristic orientation ensures that the reader is brought to the leading edge of planning and challenged and capacitated to ask and respond to questions pertaining to the future of planning.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Making a case for Coaching
Open letter to the Minister of Education and Inspector General of Police
Honourable Minister and IGP,
Recent media reports indicate that a number of teachers, including a head teacher, have been interdicted over coaching. Indeed, cases, and threats, against coaching have been so numerous in the media that one is tempted to think of the practice as unconditionally bad. Unfortunately, most editorials on the practice are not sufficiently cognisant of the cogency of the circumstances that have necessitated it. This, therefore, is to write in defence so that it will be clear, especially to the sceptics, that coaching is a contemporary educational need — especially at such a time when students’ holidays are here and it is time for coaching.
Bad Law
My initial thoughts are that your anti-coaching attitude is consequent upon the law, criminalising the practice, which is unfortunate because the law is bad— for, contrary to the basic qualities of good laws, it is not necessary, comprehensively definitive, just and, consequently, (effectively) enforceable as I will illustrate shortly.
Coaching is the giving of students extra teaching. This is why I am yet to be convinced on the necessity of a law, and policemen hours, against it. Moreover there are various school typologies: day, boarding, evening, weekend etc. I dare you to draw a line between teaching and extra teaching. In many boarding schools there are night lessons (extras); similarly, well-heeled parents, including officers of your departments, hire teachers to offer extra lessons to their children in the privacy of their homes and the law is quiet. Where then is justice in the same law when it criminalises the act of a day school calling in its students for holiday lessons and that of students choosing to see a teacher at such a time and place that they find appropriate, often with the informed support of the parents?
That coaching is bad is a famed but, unfortunately, rhetorical allegation. In fact, it may be argued that it is good because it: 1) increases guided-study time 2) allows more student-centred instruction, which is dwindling in the institutionalised classroom and 3) accesses many learners the teaching of upscale teachers, including UNEB setters and markers, they otherwise could not have accessed. I am, therefore, afraid that the anti-coaching law is based on myths rather than truths.
Myths and Truth about Coaching
Coaching makes teachers reluctant to teach well in the main stream classes. Irrespective of the true worth of this allegation, even education management novices discern that it suffices to set nonnegotiable performance targets for the teachers.
Coaching gives some students an unfair advantage. So be it, the way some students have text books that others do not have. In education, coaching — at home or otherwise — is a synonym of going the proverbial extra mile, a point on which we ought to be agreed.
Coaching is characteristically spoon-feeding. This is not as problematic as we are being caused to believe, especially because we are not clear on the gap between teaching and spoon feeding and which of the two the schools themselves are doing and with what results. We are, however, clear that whether we teach or coach, it is the same syllabus hence, the end justifies the means.
Products of coaching fail to cope with higher education. Substantiating this necessitates statistics on higher education failure rates that incriminate coaching. Otherwise, having been coaching since nursery did not keep me from earning a good degree.
Coachers are extortionists. One wonders what is wrong with a teacher offering to give (optional) extra lessons to a few students during the holidays at a fee. If it is okay for us to pay to talk to doctors, why not pay to talk to teachers?
Coaching deprives learners rest. Whereas it is agreeable that learners need a break off school work, themselves and their parents are the best judges of when to take this break. You may realise that while you can try to bar teachers from coaching, you cannot stop students who choose to spend the entire evening or holiday buried in their books.
Implicating the system
That coaching is a necessary condition for exhausting the ever widening syllabi is a truism. It is my prayer, therefore, that you either encourage the practice (and possibly allow for registration of coachers in accordance with relevant laws) or introduce a system in which teaching is clearly distinguished from extra teaching and the later is not a condition for success.
Honourable Minister and IGP,
Recent media reports indicate that a number of teachers, including a head teacher, have been interdicted over coaching. Indeed, cases, and threats, against coaching have been so numerous in the media that one is tempted to think of the practice as unconditionally bad. Unfortunately, most editorials on the practice are not sufficiently cognisant of the cogency of the circumstances that have necessitated it. This, therefore, is to write in defence so that it will be clear, especially to the sceptics, that coaching is a contemporary educational need — especially at such a time when students’ holidays are here and it is time for coaching.
Bad Law
My initial thoughts are that your anti-coaching attitude is consequent upon the law, criminalising the practice, which is unfortunate because the law is bad— for, contrary to the basic qualities of good laws, it is not necessary, comprehensively definitive, just and, consequently, (effectively) enforceable as I will illustrate shortly.
Coaching is the giving of students extra teaching. This is why I am yet to be convinced on the necessity of a law, and policemen hours, against it. Moreover there are various school typologies: day, boarding, evening, weekend etc. I dare you to draw a line between teaching and extra teaching. In many boarding schools there are night lessons (extras); similarly, well-heeled parents, including officers of your departments, hire teachers to offer extra lessons to their children in the privacy of their homes and the law is quiet. Where then is justice in the same law when it criminalises the act of a day school calling in its students for holiday lessons and that of students choosing to see a teacher at such a time and place that they find appropriate, often with the informed support of the parents?
That coaching is bad is a famed but, unfortunately, rhetorical allegation. In fact, it may be argued that it is good because it: 1) increases guided-study time 2) allows more student-centred instruction, which is dwindling in the institutionalised classroom and 3) accesses many learners the teaching of upscale teachers, including UNEB setters and markers, they otherwise could not have accessed. I am, therefore, afraid that the anti-coaching law is based on myths rather than truths.
Myths and Truth about Coaching
Coaching makes teachers reluctant to teach well in the main stream classes. Irrespective of the true worth of this allegation, even education management novices discern that it suffices to set nonnegotiable performance targets for the teachers.
Coaching gives some students an unfair advantage. So be it, the way some students have text books that others do not have. In education, coaching — at home or otherwise — is a synonym of going the proverbial extra mile, a point on which we ought to be agreed.
Coaching is characteristically spoon-feeding. This is not as problematic as we are being caused to believe, especially because we are not clear on the gap between teaching and spoon feeding and which of the two the schools themselves are doing and with what results. We are, however, clear that whether we teach or coach, it is the same syllabus hence, the end justifies the means.
Products of coaching fail to cope with higher education. Substantiating this necessitates statistics on higher education failure rates that incriminate coaching. Otherwise, having been coaching since nursery did not keep me from earning a good degree.
Coachers are extortionists. One wonders what is wrong with a teacher offering to give (optional) extra lessons to a few students during the holidays at a fee. If it is okay for us to pay to talk to doctors, why not pay to talk to teachers?
Coaching deprives learners rest. Whereas it is agreeable that learners need a break off school work, themselves and their parents are the best judges of when to take this break. You may realise that while you can try to bar teachers from coaching, you cannot stop students who choose to spend the entire evening or holiday buried in their books.
Implicating the system
That coaching is a necessary condition for exhausting the ever widening syllabi is a truism. It is my prayer, therefore, that you either encourage the practice (and possibly allow for registration of coachers in accordance with relevant laws) or introduce a system in which teaching is clearly distinguished from extra teaching and the later is not a condition for success.
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