Kyambogo university students to report bacK in febuary

The Chancellor of Kyambogo University, Prof Eli Katunguka, yesterday revealed that they will reopen in February for continuing students to complete their semester after spending nine months at home without studying.

When government closed all institutions of learning in March due to the outbreak of Covid-19, most continuing students in universities were remaining with six weeks to conclude their end of 2019/2020 semester.

Addressing a press conference at the university yesterday, Prof Katunguka said they plan to reopen for continuing students on February 1. 

He said the students will study for two weeks before sitting end of semester exams.

According to Prof Katunguka, students will first be taught online for two weeks starting January 18 before  physically reporting at campus on February 1.

“Students will be subjected to final exams from February 15 to 21. I ask all students who had not completed the tuition fees for this semester to do so because those with tuition balance will not be allowed to sit for the exams,” he said.

He also revealed that first year students who were currently admitted will report for the 2020/2021 academic year on March 1.
Prof Katunguka, however, said their roadmap will depend on government’s decision to reopen all institutions of learning for other learners rather than finalists.

“If the government reopens institutions of learning for continuing students, we shall go by the outlined roadmap. If they  don’t, we shall not. I am sure the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health will have made a decision on reopening of schools by February 1,” he said.

The State minister for Higher Education, Mr John Chrysostom Muyingo, during the education sector review recently, said the decision to reopen education institutions for other classes will be determined after the ministry’s team, which is conducting inspection of schools, by end of this month.

The teams are slated to hand over the national inspection report to the Ministry of Education on December 29.Advertisement

 Mr Katunguka said Kyambogo University had about 32,000 students. Of these, 13,000 were finalists who have completed their exams and are going for internship and school practice before graduation. He revealed that they  will be expecting about 28,000 students including the first year students next year.

At a moment, government through the Ministry of Education has sent a team of inspectors to re-inspect about 1,800 institutions to ascertain their compliance with the set Special Operating Procedures (SOPs) and level of readiness to reopen.

Kyambogo decry budget cuts
Meanwhile, speaking at a different function within the university, Prof Katunguka decried budget cuts for infrastructure development in the 2021/2022 financial year.

While commissioning the university main gate that has been under construction since May , Prof   Katunguka said they asked government for Shs6.4b  as capital budget for infrastructure developments but government has approved only Shs840m for the financial year 2021/2022.

“The Ministry of Fnance should allow universities to use their capital budget to develop their infrastructure. This is the money we collect from students  to develop their learning environment hence cutting it is not right,” he said.

He added: “We ask the Ministry of Finance to always sit and discuss what areas to cut but not the capital budgets. 

Kyambogo University previously had not been receiving capital budget from the government. In the last this financial year running, we asked for Shs720m but government has so far released only Shs400m.It looks like someone wants to frustrate Kyambogo.”

According to the university secretary, Mr Charles Okello, the university budget is usually about Shs143b. Of this, Shs77b is collected  from the student’s tuition fee,Shs3b from donors and Shs58b from the government. 

Mr Jim Mugunga , the public relations officer of Ministry of Finance, said  the ministry has not yet approved the 2021/2022 budget so it is too early for Kyambogo to start making consultations.