Education Minister Janet Museveni said it’s not the right time to reopen schools and revealed that her ministry is developing an ICT and e-learning framework which will guide education institutions on distance learning.
In the meantime, she added it was still unsafe for government to reopen schools after observing the coronavirus trends within the country and picking lessons from other countries which had tried to reopen but closed again after a resurgence of the virus.
As such, they agreed to continue facilitating home-schooling as they monitor the situation. She asked parents to assist their children in this period when they are at home to learn a skill but also follow the study materials that government will provide in print and broadcast to aid continuity of learning.
Ms Janet Museveni clarified that her ministry has not prohibited e-learning and reiterated that the first phase of distance learning was hampered with lack of radios, televisions, few printed materials and limited knowledge from parents to guide the children.
“There has been a misconception in the media that the Ministry of Education and Sports prohibited e-learning. This is absolutely not true; we cannot be the ones banning what we are promoting. A number of institutions including Uganda Christian University, Makerere University and several International Schools in Basic and Secondary levels have been utilizing e-learning, even before the outbreak of Covid-19,” Ms Museveni’s statement reads in part. This was her third address to the nation since the outbreak of the pandemic.
While the government offered to supply radios to all homesteads to supplement the e-learning, it is not clear how children whose parents are illiterate will be helped to grasp concepts.
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