Adjumani education department urged to recruit more teachers

The Adjumani district education department has been urged to recruit more teachers in order to address the growing challenge of understaffing in government primary schools.

The call occurred at a CSBAG meeting to share their report from 40 district primary schools.

According to CSBAG, most schools are struggling with a high pupil-to-teacher ratio, with some classes being handled by a single teacher, which has greatly affected the quality of learning and performance of pupils.

The findings also highlighted cases where schools lack specialized teachers for special need pupils, leaving pupils disadvantaged compared to their peers in other districts.

Speaking during the meeting, Apidra Peter, the field officer for CSBAG, stressed that there is need for more teachers to be recruited to fill the gaps.

“The discrimination was to share the findings from the schools with the key stakeholders in the district so that collectively we agree on how to improve on service delivery.

“What emerged is the number of teachers to the pupils. I find that the gap is big. On average, we have 73% compared to the 53% at the national level. Our recommendation is that the district recruit more teachers to fill the existing gaps.”

Apidra also added: “We also recommended that the district look for money and procure more desk.”

Vusia Virginia, headteacher of Miniki primary school said her school has only five teachers who are on the pay roll.

“There are those schools which are really having a smaller number of teachers because like Miniki, we are only five government teachers for 961 learners,” Vusia said.

The district education officer of Adjumani Dima Robert has acknowledged the concerns raised and said that they have plans of recruiting more teachers for primary schools but they are still waiting for clearance from the district service commission.

“As the head of department, the findings are correct and the concerns are very correct. On staffing, for primary, we have a staff ceiling of 801 and those that are in the payroll are 687. We are waiting for the clearance of 110 by the public service before we are able to recruit,” said DEO Dima Robert.

The principle chief administrative officer of Adjumani Edema Richard appreciated CSBAG for always standing with the district and, urged them to continue supporting them.

“Mine is to ask CSBAG to continue strengthening our capacity as local government. There is a saying that you cannot see yourself unless you use a mirror. So, CSBAG you are a mirror of our Adjumani district local government,” Edema noted.

Adjumani district has approved shs49,372,995,000 for financial year 2025/26 and shs17,135,858,847 was allocated for education department.