Community Participation for Gender and Girl friendly Schools

Community Participation for Gender and Girl friendly Schools

 By ELECU

In Uganda, the collaboration of schools with their surrounding communities is becoming very important because these communities are increasingly being called upon to support and complement the efforts of governments in the provision of education, particularly basic education. Communities are key actors in enrolment campaigns, assessing and monitoring schools, organizing school feeding programmes and in building school infrastructure, while functional adult literacy linked to children’s literacy development may also become an instrument of community participation and change. To facilitate community-school ownership, schools and communities need to listen to and collaboratively address each other’s needs.

Community involvement includes participation in school programmes; being role models or trainers; encouraging, supporting and enforcing discipline at school, at home and in the community; and contributing resources to improve the social welfare and academic performance of students, and teachers. Parents and community members can participate in the process of school-based curriculum development and implementation through the provision of teaching/learning materials and facilities like gardens and workshops for teaching and demonstration purposes. As Mulemwa (2001) pointed out; “The involvement of communities in school curricula in this particular way is extremely desirable and stops the alienation of the school and learners, from the community. The learner, particularly the girl child is assisted to access, enjoy and participate more actively in the learning of science, mathematics and technological subjects”.

To achieve these benefits, systematic and regular sensitization of the communities about the importance of education and special needs of the girl child is vital. Empowered school communities are involved in supporting basic education and demonstrate this through adequate monitoring of education quality contributions to meet identified needs of schools. Thus, a good relationship between schools and community cause schools to prosper academically and otherwise.

Strategies from ELECU on Community participation for gender and girl friendly schools

The Education Local Expertise Center(ELECU) together with its grassroots partner organizations has implemented several interventions to make schools girl friendly. We see the teachers, the pupils, the school management representatives and the community members as actors in realizing a positive change in school environment for girls. We involve local government structures from the initiation of programmes to close-out phases; and build capacity of selected community members (School Management Committees and Parents Teachers Associations) to ensure appropriate functional systems are in place. We have found the following to be very instrumental:

1.      Sensitization and training of PTAs, SMCs and local leaders on their roles and responsibilities according to the Education Act, 2008. The output of this training includes selection of able community members as local school monitoring teams with clear monitoring rosters.

2.      Training of teachers, members of School Management Committees (SMC), and Parents Teachers Association (PTA) on psychosocial support, child protection and teachers code of conduct.

3.      Training of senior women teachers in guidance and counseling; participants then develop action plans for implementation in the schools

4.      Training of senior women teachers, girls and their mothers in making local sanitary towels.

5.                  Holding dialogue meetings with members of schools SMCs and PTA to address specific issues and obtain commitment and action.

1.      Holding community dialogues on how best education of children, especially girls can be improved.

2.      Orientation of teachers and school administration to the teachers’ code of conduct.

3.      Engaging district stakeholders in advocacy meetings for improving school environment for girls.

4.      Facilitating training for head teachers and deputy head teachers in leadership, management and supervisory skills.

5.      Involvement all the Head teachers, members of SMCs, PTAs, LC III Chair persons and Secretaries for education other stakeholders in an annual District Education Conference.

As a result of sensitization and training of PTAs, SMCs and local leaders on their roles and responsibilities according to the Education Act, 2008, sub county leadership and some districts (Tororo, Lira) have made bye-laws requiring that parents contribute maize and 1000 shillings for the children’s meal. In Kwapa Sub County in Tororo District, children in all 13 schools now have lunch at school. In Totokidwe Primary School in Tororo, in Term I only 89 pupils received lunch at school but by third Term, the number had increased to 234.

The training of members of SMC/PTA and teachers also helped in defining roles of the SMCs and PTAs and parents in Ateri and Awiodyek primary schools (Lira District). Parents are more willing to contribute towards the development fund and also provide scholastic materials for the pupils. For example, in Ateri primary school parents agreed to contribute UGX 5000 for incentives to teachers; and in Awiodyek primary school parents have agreed to contribute bricks and sand for the construction of teachers’ houses and increase the development fee from UGX 2,000 to UGX 5,000.

One Resident District Commissioner who previously barred schools from charging parents for any item had a change of heart due to sensitization. He demonstrated this by contributing 5 bags of cement at Kidokolo P.S and 4 trips of sand at Bugaba Primary School; and encouraging parents to support schools in all ways. Parents in these 2 schools are making building blocks for building a classroom block, have roofed a 4 classroom block and in Kidokolo, contribute a sum of 90,000 per teacher for the 3 teachers who are not on the government payroll. As a result, teachers report early for classes, children do not sit under trees or shacks during lessons and there is reduced absenteeism.