Government Reserves Sh60 Billion for Free A-Level

Al-Mahdi Ssenkabirwa

27 May 2011

Government has earmarked Shs58.8 billion in the next budget to kick-start the free A-Level education recently promised by President Museveni.

Mr Godfrey Dhatemwa, the commissioner for education planning, confirmed yesterday that the scheme will start in February next year.

“We would have liked to start the programme this year for USE students who sat Senior Four last year to benefit but we had to first do some planning before rolling it out,” he said.

President Museveni pledged free A-Level education during his re-election campaigns to enable poor children who have already benefited from free primary and secondary education advance their studies.

However, the delay in implementing the scheme means the 104,000 USE students who sat their S4 exams last year will not benefit from free A-Levels.

If free A-Level education kicks-off, there will be need for more USE A-Level schools. Ministry of Education records show that of the 970 government-aided schools implementing USE, only 228 have A-Level, and can only accommodate 36,000 students per year.

Despite the high dropout rate, the USE programme increased Senior One enrollment by 33 per cent between 2007 and 2008. Last year, it was rolled-out to cover Senior Four, completing the cycle for lower secondary education.

Government pays private schools Shs58,000 for each student under USE per term, while government-aided schools and technical training and vocational institutions receive Sh41,000 and Shs150,000 per student, respectively.

Government spends over Shs100 billion on both USE and UPE annually, a figure bigger than what some ministries get as their resource envelopes.

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