Morning lessons at Kihungu Primary School temporarily halted over shortage of teachers

BY XAVIER KULE & ISAAC MUMBERE

Morning lessons at Kihungu Primary School in Kyarumba Sub-county, Bukonzo County East in Kasese district were today put on halt as some teachers complained of allegedly being understaffed.

The teachers, who argued that the pupils at the institution sometimes miss other lessons due to the inadequacy in the staffing levels, called for the intervention of the District Education Officer into the matter.

Ms Loice Kabugho, the School’s Head teacher says by the end of last year, the closed the term with 09 teachers, adding that they were happy when the District Education department deployed three more teachers to the institution as the new term began on February 05, 2024.

But to their dismay, the newly deployed teachers have since disappeared from the institution and transferred to other schools before even the term ends and without replacement.

Kabugho argues that today morning, only 05 out of 09 teachers turned up to attend to an enrolment of 502 pupils, hence making it hard for them to offer effective services to their clients.

The Head teacher has since appealed to the District Education department to return the transferred teachers despite having fewer staff houses to accommodate all the teachers.

Mr. Henry Bwambale Kibingo, the P.T.A Chairperson at Kihungu Primary School, notes that they have been informing the Office of the District Education Officer about the low staffing levels at the institution but nothing has been done. 

He also suggests to the District Education Officer to urgently respond to their requests since the school is located in the hard to reach area.

Mr. Reuben Muthende, a teacher claims that he has never seen an Inspector of Schools at the institution for the last 13 years he has completed working at the same place of work.

He also says that the low staffing levels makes them tiresome, appealing to the concerned officials to respond to their plea.

In the recently released 2023 Primary Examination results, Kihungu Primary School did not have any candidate pass in Division One but had 11 on Division Two, 10 in Division Three and only 03 in Division Four.

Efforts to get a comment from the District Education Officer were futile by press time.

ENDS

2 Comments

  • Mubatsi wa Kathulha February 27, 2024

    I am a resident of Kihungu and one of the immediate neighbors of the school. I am an OB of this school. I saw the blackboards of the school from 1995_2003 when I completed P7. During the period above, Kihungu was ranked one of the best schools in Bukonzo East County. It actually competed with Kagando Ps. Most of the teachers by then were residents of the area who woke up from their homes to go and teach. Since 2004,the school’s performance has been deteriorating. This is so because these teachers were transferred to other schools and they brought other teachers from distant places to come and teach there.
    How come teachers are just transferred to schools far from their areas of their residence?
    Why can’t those in charge of the transfers first see where a teacher comes from before they transfer them to a distant school?
    How can an inspector of schools take more than a decade without inspecting a school in their area of jurisdiction? Aren’t they given salary?
    When they see a school which was performing deteriorating what do they think?
    I offer myself to give guidance on how this school can be helped to have the worries of the headteacher solves
    Mubatsi wa Kathulha
    0772701111

  • Baluku Benson February 27, 2024

    Kihungu primary school is the biggest project in the parish of kihungu. Take it or leave. If at all deteriorate the parish will go backward in development.
    This should be a concern of parents, local leaders and every area development officer.
    Some of us who went through the school feels sad for the situation at the school because we know how we performed.

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