AFTERWARDS

When the Present has latched its postern behind my tremulous stay,
And the May month flaps its glad green leaves like wings,
Delicate-filmed as new-spun silk, will the neighbours say,
‘He was a man who used to notice such things’?

If it be in the dusk when, like an eyelid’s soundless blink,
The dewfall-hawk comes crossing the shades to alight
Upon the wind-warped upland thorn, a gazer may think,
‘To him this must have been a familiar sight.’

If I pass during some nocturnal blackness, mothy and warm,
When the hedgehog travels furtively over the lawn,
One may say, ‘He strove that such innocent creatures should come to no harm,
But he could do little for them; and now he is gone.’

If, when hearing that I have been stilled at last, they stand at the door,
Watching the full-starred heavens that winter sees
Will this thought rise on those who will meet my face no more,
‘He was one who had an eye for such mysteries’?

And will any say when my bell of quittance is heard in the gloom
And a crossing breeze cuts a pause in its outrollings,
Till they rise again, as they were a new bell’s boom,
‘He hears it not now, but used to notice such things’?

Thomas Hardy

Do atheists backslide?

Loosing Faith in faith. Coming soon…

The Mis-educaton of the Ugandan psyche..

Forget the grandiose title, this is another one about Uganda’s education system and  its nay-sayers. Somehow I stumbled onto this, so my patriotic self gave his two-cents’ worth. That post reminded me of a  debate that has been going on for a very long time, is Uganda’s education system relevant for today’s learner or better yet for Uganda’s needs, both current and future?

Similar debates, or is it criticisms? for they are mostly one-sided rants, have appeared or aired over the media and taxi conversations. There is one that I dread to hear most, the one about how in developed countries, unlike in Uganda, children’s gifts are identified very early in life, so the children are channeled [mark that word] into life-long careers. In effect, this kind, like pixelstories in the link mentioned earlier criticise the broadness of the curriculum, preferring, by implication, a more specialised education system. Now dear reader, the same school of thought goes on to say compartmentalisation of education is not good as this is seen later on when the ertswhile student is confronted with a real-life problem solving situation. This gives birth to a  more flexible combination of subject choices at the Advanced level, such subject combinations like math, ganda literature, and maybe throw in some micro-biology would make a good pot-pourri, a more wholly formed schooled fellow is churned [or channeled!?] out.

Don’t even bother with those school-vs-education quotes, school has never been more relevant at any time than today. With the avalanche of knowledge that sorrounds the learner today, the traditional role of the school, teacher(s) in particular, that of scaffolding the learning process is so important, what with youtube, google, wikiuniversity, and the ubiquitous motor mouthed know-it-all sitted in a muzigo near you! This knowledge  can only be organised in a school setting to bear fruit. Which brings me to that quote I am contemplating tatooing somewhere on my body, we go to school to learn how to learn..

The blogger in question, questions the relevancy of the study of Metternich’s follies, the relevancy of the Crimean war to an average matooke-eating, jigger-infested Ugandan lad or lassie. In my comment, I cite Bloom’s taxonomy of educational goals and objectives, and I have done so in a similar post,  as a better yardstick of benchmarking the relevancy of Uganda’s education system. Is it not funny, that such a one, queries the relevance of studying Ruhr cornubation development story, yet wholeheartedly embraces a romanticised revision of the rebuilding of the NewYork World Trade towers? My examples are relevant to the extentent that both take place at a time when both countries are reeling from the devastating effects of war or something similar to it, the quintenssential development studies story!

So shall we say the learner failed to see the relevancy of these events to today’s world problems or the teacher failed to teach the learner the importance of these events in the grander scheme of things? Of course that is slippery ground, in Uganda the Educationists are most of the time previously mediocre students, or cash-strapped students who could not afford the ‘real’ courses, truth be told. It is my conviction that using Bloom’s classic model, any object of study, in the hands of a good teacher, can produce a well rounded individual.

Personally, I believe the education sytem of Uganda suffers from a problem of its own creation, teachers that are averse to new knowlege, and ways of gathering it. And as for, the curriculum, a more integrated one would answer her problems. The good news is that the so-called vocational subjects are already piloting a thematic curriculum similar to that which is taking root in the primary school sector- the Integrated Production Skills Module.

Did I not, through the previous paragraph, contradict all I was saying in this post? Thse search contiues in …… the ensuing posts.

m

It does not even come close to May by Elly Wamala :~). Sara Tavare’s Exala is it. Abawuliriza ebirala, ebyo byabwe.

Embalasasa!

Yes, embalasasa, it said title and I thought why not give ‘em the title of what I am listening to? Right now I can not stop playing Samite’s streaming media, Olusoka, Look for the Sunset, and of course Embalasasa. Olusoka for the flute, Look for the sunset has a great sultry female voice in there, sounds like the angelic Angela Kalule, and embalasasa for the piano.

I cannot help but paint a picture of a lethargic Mulondo being carried to wherever , calling to his Jajja nti embalasasa eruma, ayanguwe tugitte. Owubutiko, well I have news for you, etuluma! Yajja n’erangi era nnungi nnyo gwe why not if the NewVision’s polls are to be believed?

Well as Onyango Obbo says in his weekly dispatch from Nairobi, if the embalasasa is holding a gun to our heads, how can we, yes me and my jajja, kill it? So divine providence is suffering, us for why doesn’t (him, it) kill it?

A lesson in Comparing.

I find the way Ugandans flip-flop about the Ugandan Education system interesting, to say the least. One moment there are castigating it for its comprehensiveness, then the next, they go on about its compartmentalisation. This they say in view of the dismal performance the Ugandans put up in a certain University TV Quiz show.

If anyone is so desperate to measure or compare education systems, using the Zain Challenge, the slightest chance could be found in the off-cuff answers that they give when the moderator asks them about themselves. Look out for the subtle nuances of personal communication, though unfortunately, these also seem to be rehearsed lately, not in the answers they give to those cognitive or rote/memory answers.

A wider criterion should be used to compare education systems. Given the Kenyans and the West Africans exhibit greater hunger (for the money?) or aggressiveness compared to the others. Methinks a fairer comparison could take into consideration the other aspects we measure, namely, the psycho-motor and affective domains of any curriculum.

Comparing it to the regional systems, most notably the Kenyan one is myopic. African and Ugandan systems of education need a 180°shift away from that continuum of 7-4-2-3 Vs the 8-4-4-3 systems.  We should be developing curriculum that answers her current and most importantly imminent problems. These problems are going to be solved, partly, by T.V quiz shows, if you like, that ask for reasoning, applicability of knowledge and  not shows that ask them to name members of the Military High Command of the SPLA.

Surprisingly, more ‘obscene’ TV shows can be said to be more apt at asking the right questions. Yes they have more time and resources, so please do not use memory quizzes to measure efficiency of education systems.

Kiyemba Mukasa

agent256.wordpress.com

Vagaries of Poorupbringing

This is for you Sserumaga. Weebale Omwoyo gwa Buganda ogutafa.

Ladies and gentlemen, please join in me in welcoming yet a new release from Africa’s premier Record Label- Uganda, well known for its release/publishing of monster hit albums. True to its form, reminiscent of the 60′s into the 70′s, its latest album titled the “vAGARIES OF pOOR uPBRINGING” has success written all over it.

It opens with a cheesy tune titled Kimeeze. On this one the lead female vocalist, a princess in the Nyoro kingdom belts out a tune decrying the way ebimeeza are sabotaging the oil siphoning or pilferage schemas. It is arranged with electronic beats that you could hear on Philly Lutaaya’s Hanifa.

Incitement is the next track. Though it must be said that this review is more concerned with the lyrics especially that the reviewer comes from a Kadongokamu background. On this track, one erstwhile herds-boy insults a traditional chief again and again thereby precipitating a gradual resentment that finally results in riots, wherefore any kind of comment is deemed as an inciting remark. By the end of the song the question is, what is more inciting?

One gets the feeling that Broadcasting Council was a quick hash hash job done to raise he mandatory six songs to finish the album by the producer, a one Mutaabazi. A few radio stations are shot and disabled just like some rioters -suspended, while one is shot and killed. This one was becoming a malignant tumour. The question is was this a conduit or source of the incitement.

Scarecrow is a mid-tempo track, that begins with a choral intro, which choir seems to be composed of ghosts of the 1994 Rwanda genocide played on Radio Millie Collins. If taxed to storyboard the video for this song, yours truly would not forget to include something from the Mukura massacres, or better yet Atiak or Kichwamba massacres as a futuristic yet anachronistic way of showing the imminence of the genocide.

In a Lucky Dubesque style, poor on poor oppression, charts seeks to raise the way the rioters turn on each other forgetting the real enemy, they seem to desire to apportion blame for the poverty they are balls-deep in.

VERDICT: this is a nice album that of course could not run away from the now ubiquitous
auto-tune, yet remains true to the mould of the African dictator that gradually moves from being a blue-eyed boy of the colonialists to akabwa keweyolera.

Get yourself a copy at the nearest street corner, ask any red beret wearing salesman, they seldom carry clubs and assault rifles because of the now rampant piracy bedevilling the music industry.

WORKSHOP IN ALL ITS GLORY

THAT IS THE WORKSHOP. ON THE LEFT YOU CAN SEE THE BELT SANDER WE USE TO SMOOTH OUT THE BAMBOO.

bassoka kwaavula

Today is the first day of April 2009, what this means is that it is exactly one month since project Nansana Crafts began. So what has transpired since the beginning of March? Well ‘we’ moved to that there place. Purchased a counter, did very basic furnishing of the studio. The novelty of moving into a new home and surroundings wore off soon because one of the directors was missing in action because of procrastination on one hand, and ‘bureaucracy’ on the other. The latter was sort of dealt with, though not to a logical conclusion. This can be surmised to have precipitated the other director’s action of taking off a good two weeks to do long over due volunteer work. A christening punctuated those two weeks, the dubious circumstances surrounding the affair were serenaded with a ‘sacrifice’, a badly needed one it must be said. The lack of a clear PERT scheme of work has hindered progress. Arbitrary expenditure is surely going to come back to haunt the partnership. Together with all this mess, throw in unrealistic expectations of more funding. Director One had some samples done using what we shall call a normal sewing machine and these spurred a Dilbert eureka moment. Combining chainmaile born of brass wires and using the aforementioned sewing, would cause a stampede on the ‘stock exchange’ as it were. Furthermore include some cow-horn magic and voila. Almost going bamboo, for great strides were made in the embellishment of the hairpins; we got two redundant hands to do the beadwork. The average unit of production per individual is still very low. We are still working out the best wage system. Meanwhile, we are yet to secure a miter saw, varnish, packaging material and a drill machine. As for obtaining orders for our products we are still reluctant especially since we do not have samples to solicit clients. There hasn’t been serious communication with Director three, who is owed an explanation as evidenced by that text message he sent to us last Sunday. Something ought to be done as soon as yesterday. Speaking of the internet, it turned out great leather working resources and demonstrated further the feasibility of the leather industry. To be continued…..

ekigulira Magala eddiba..

Uganda is doomed if the people waiting in the wings are equally as inept as those in government right now. Take the example of Rubaga North MP Betty Kamya’s latest obsession with compensation- or whatever the bollocks in her brain choose to call it- to the Nakivubo park-yard vendors, for the cleansing fire –in my opinion- that wiped out that market last month.

In her very commendable way, she raises debate on the various forum available so as her constituents can be part of the national debate.

The simplistic economics theorizing she does is a disservice to her constituency. For one whose relationship with leather goes further than buying imported leather products like us mere mortals, she should know better than support 10,000 dealers of second hand leather products.
If you will, let us engage ourselves in my version of basic economics, a pair of shoes produced here irrespective of its quality will yield more jobs than a second-hand pair from Brazil or Europe, multiply that with the volume of trade that goes on in that ‘another-fire-waiting-to-happen’ yard. And therein, dear reader, lies our problem, we would rather fret and rant about fire immobilizing traders – insurers should stoke the fire for sensitization, pun intended tha

The MP of the people, you are, inadvertently or otherwise, basing on an either basal opportunistic premise or a seemingly universal sentimentalism to entrench Uganda in the consumption abyss it is rutted in already. All I am saying is we should look at the broader picture, step back from all the rubble and smoke and look at Uganda’s bigger problem, She needs jobs for her youth, who are more fertile than their progenitors by the way!, and not directing her energies on compensating naïve traders.

That argument about precedents set by a one Museveni on the Basajjabalaba bailing out affair, is as good as saying that he should also use his Gulfstream to take all mothers who cannot make it to the local dispensary in Kyaggunda to some ultra modern Germany maternity outfit. Methinks the 23 shots of Corruption lager have started hazing your ‘vision’, the NRM looks beautiful to you, with every other shot. The NRM transgressions have and will start paling in comparison with the warped thinking the NRM has led Ugandans believe is the way things are supposed to be done.

In a seeming pyro-maniacal way, I say we should have more of these fires so that like those ‘backward’ ancestors said, “ekiswaaza ammanyo, kubakusesema”, we can see what naïve traders (read city tycoons) and their opportunistic MPs are building the nation on. We need to drown so that we can be cleansed, it is called sacrifice. And considering so much abounds nowadays, from supposed ritual murders to presidential sacrifices.

Decisions made when high on the basis of emotional shit are seldom f

Antoinettesque ambitions.

It is Language, stupid.