Factors affecting the implementation of the right to education in Uganda: a case study of access to tertiary education.

Abstract

This study examined the factors affecting implementation of the right to education in Uganda with specific reference to access to tertiary education. The general objective of the study was to find out factors affecting the implementation of the right to tertiary education in Uganda especially access. It adopted three specific objectives, which were; to assess people’s awareness to the policies employed by the government to address the right to tertiary education, investigate the implementation of this right and examine the challenges faced in it implementation. Questionnaires, interview guides, focus group discussion and observation were used to collect the data.

The result indicated that the right to education has considerably received a growing awareness among the Uganda’s elite communities, though a few respondents directly linked it to the existing international, regional and domestic human rights standards set to help enhance its provision and promote access. The research realised the following education initiatives put to help promote the provision; affirmative action, liberalized education provision, its entrenchment as a right in the 1995 Constitution, creation of Universities and other Tertiary Institutions Act 2001 and National Council for Higher Education (NCHE) to help streamline and regulate its provision.

Limited access was attributed to mainly poverty, war, gender bias, limited infrastructures, AIDS scourge, widespread unemployment and low government involvement. No institutional frame-works with strict legal backing and attention have yet been put in place as checks to the constraints so as to help protect this right. Regional access is still at a remarkable gap and gender equity at enrolment still low.

There is need for policy shifts with legal implications that will create opportunities and empower students seek education, incorporate the public to participate actively in providing tertiary education and reinforce the right to education through interventions for strategic applications.