By Joshua Niyonshima
Some of the best quotes in the world, revolve around the role of a teacher.
“The best teacher teaches from the heart and not from the book, a teacher takes a hand, opens a mind and touches a heart, a good teacher is like a candle, it consumes itself, to light the way for others”
Despite of these truths, the Covid -19 pandemic, left the educators exposed to challenges they were least prepared for, out of work and out of purpose.
The Kisoro district Uganda National Teachers Union (UNATU) coordinator Matata Alex has called on members of the public to take time to celebrate the role of the teacher despite being put out of action during the lockdown.
The comments come on the eve of World Teachers Day, celebrated on 5th of October every year.
This year’s theme, according to Matata is, “Teachers at the heart of Education recovery in post Covid-19 era.”.
Matata explained that the country will be holding virtual celebrations this year.
“The National celebrations to be held at State House on Tuesday 05th October 2021 with only 50 participants. Of these, 25 will be teachers and the rest will be officials from the Ministry of Education and other related agencies, said Matata
The head of Welfare in UNATU Wilson Habiyakare who doubles as the Head teacher of Chuho Primary School thanked God and UNATU for having spearheaded the promotion of 45 deputy Head teachers, recruitment of new teachers and promotion of education assistants to senior Education Teachers during such a precocious time.
He also applauded the Government for having kept paying government teachers even when schools remain closed.
Staggering Statistics indicate that a number of school going girls have gotten pregnant while school going boys have abandoned the journey of enlightenment for the hopes of making money from the streets.
Cultural Education should be re-adopted
Cultural tales and Folklore tale stories around the fire, is what the early 20th and 21st century folks grew up, the fear of the unknown was fortified.
According to Hakizumwami Buker, head teacher to Kisoro Vision Secondary School, one of the leading schools in Kigezi region says, the call to return to cultural education is long overdue because foreign exposure is fast eroding the moral fabric of Ugandans.
“70% of our population, ideally should be in school therefore because of the lockdown, many young people are lost. The idea of blended learning is a stretch because those who have access to smart phone technology will be interested in Music and Sports, but what about Moral fiber? Hakizumwami explained.
Hakizumwami further explained that culture died after westernization took over adding that the problem is that, citizens were not ready.
Back then, when we had children and they were messing up, you would not only reprimand but you would punish them but nowadays, that is no longer possible,
Hakizumwami explained that it is impossible now to tell children to present a Kifumbira Cultural dance because they have brain washed with foreign influence. He further noted that children of today can only copy but cannot reproduce, create or innovative
“In economics, when you only consume and cannot produce, you are in balance of payment deficit, the biggest problem of Corona pandemic has been livelihood, and back then when people took time to teach their children on how to survive, fathers would teach children how to hunt and girls to manage the home, but all that has been lost”, Hakizumwami noted.
He further noted that it is affordable. Parents, grandparents were involved.
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