Lira Integrated School and Gulu University

Today we finally made it to Lira Integrated School (LIS). It is a good size school comprised of a nursery, primary, and a secondary in the outskirts of the town. The school caters to a total of about 1100 students. We met with a few key people in the school, toured their facilities, and learned about the school operations. Jonathan, the head teacher for the secondary section was very knowledgeable and gave us some key points on where to begin our research along with a bit of background on the surrounding Universities and how they operate be it in the public or private sector.

After a short break, we proceeded to travel about 150 km (2 hour trip) north-west of our location to Gulu, where we made a stop at the local University to meet with some more key informants, of which the Dean of education and three faculty members. The information they had to offer about the public sector concretized the picture of higher education in Northern Uganda. Apparently, the public sector has less trouble filling up its classes with students, but experiences the reverse issue with qualified instructors. Because of high tuition costs, students would rather get admitted to the inexpensive and distinguished Makarere University (the main public university in Kampala), and for those who fail to make the “cut” their other option is to use their own resources to fund their way into a private University. Private universities tend to attract more of the qualified instructors because of the more generous pay. Also, students are often willing to relocate to fulfill their educational needs, hence most would decide to move to Kampala because of the centralized nature of available services and social assets on a national level. More elements factor into this dynamic, but you have the general picture.

In any case, that’s what we did today… it was pretty productive… and here is a little hello from Alejandra and Babina’s new friendly neighbors: John and the rest of his friends.