Prof George Openjuru Ladaa, the Gulu University Deputy Vice Chancellor has said Uganda’s current Uganda education system needs an overhaul.
Speaking on Tuesday during a donation of medical text books to the university, Prof Openjuru said Uganda’s education system is skewed towards university education and white collar jobs.
The prof said that universities across the world are changing focus from being elitist to addressing and changing community lives and the environment around them.
The Senior Integrated Program Director, at World Vision- Uganda, Tina Mkunda, said at the book donation event that World Vision is advocating for a review of the current education system.
Mkunda said Uganda’s education is designed in such a way that those who cannot attain higher education cannot be absorbed into the labour market. She said this needs to be reversed so that youth who drop out of school can be productive citizens even if they do not attain university education.
According to Mkunda, one of the key things that Uganda’s education should offer to learners is life skills.
However, Robert Oceng Odok, the Commissioner for Higher Education who was speaking at the same book event described Uganda’s’ education system as ‘’very good.’’
Odok noted that over the years, Ugandan students who go to pursue Masters and PhDs programs in universities in the United Kingdom, India, Australia and China score highly and are praised for their academic excellence.
Odok, however, admitted that the country’s education system was designed in a way that everybody should attain university education and get a white collar job.