Four visually-impaired candidates who are set to begin their UCE exams on Tuesday at Hornby High School in Kabale District have expressed confidence to pass with better grades because they have been prepared well by their teachers.
The candidates include Kugonza Atuweredwa (19), Brenda Musimenta (16), Sharot Tukamushaba (16) and Isaac Nowamani (20). ‘We shall excel in these examinations because our teachers prepared us very well. We also prepared ourselves through group discussion, private reading in the evening and early morning,’ Mr Kugonza Atuweredwa said in an interview with Daily Monitor yesterday.
The candidates also said they liked the new curriculum because it helped them exercise their competencies and capabilities despite their disabilities.
‘The new curriculum has helped us in brainstorming with the sighted students while doing some projects and some of the sighted students that have been taking us for granted because of our disabilities, appreciated our potential.
‘The new curriculum has broken the barriers that existed between the visually-impaired and the sighted students since its competence based,’ Nowamani said.
He added that there was a need for allocating more time to the visually-impaired candidates while doing the national examinations because they are not as swift as their sighted colleagues.
The students described their education journey as a rough one that has been characterised by challenges that include lack of school fees and the required scholastic materials, among other social aspects such as being orphans.
‘My education journey has not been straight because being an orphan, my mother could not afford raising all the needed requirements for my special needs education.
I am grateful to God that I have been cleared to sit for the Uneb exams after which I will get a Uganda Certificate of Education. My dream is to become a journalist so that I can serve the community, my second dream is to become a lawyer so that I can advocate for the rights of the marginalised people,’ Tukamushaba said.
On his part Nowamani, who lost his sight at the age of three, due to a strange disease said his dream is to become an entrepreneur so that he can employ people.
The head teacher at Hornby High School, Mr George Aturebire Tumusiime, said a total of 40 candidates, including 4 candidates with visual impairment were cleared to sit for the Uneb exams at his school.
Initiative
Mr Tumusiime said the blind section that was started at his school in 1981, is currently accommodating 48 students, of which 18 are boys. He added that the conducive teaching and learning environment at his school has helped the visually-impaired students to excel in academics at both O-Level and A-Level despite challenges of inadequate equipment and special scholastic materials.
‘We need support on computers and scholastic materials so that we can offer timely quality education services to the visually impaired students at our school.
Although we are grateful to the different organisations and individuals for supporting the education needs of our visually-impaired students, we need more financial support to enable us to offer quality education.
‘Currently, we have only 20 computers available for the visually-impaired students yet we have a total of 48 and this means that we need 28 more computers so that each student can use a computer instead of sharing with another one,’ Mr Tumusiime said.
He also appealed to the government to consider the recruitment of more special needs teachers to solve the problem of manpower gaps.