THE semester began on a lacklustre note, with students dragging their feet to attend lectures. And, with some temporary changes put into place at the Mass Communication department, like merging of lectures, students on day programme are less upbeat on attending evening lectures.
Until further notice, day students will remain merged with their colleagues in the evening class in such course units as Television Production, Public Affairs Reporting, and Specialised Writing for third years and Introduction to Broadcasting for second years.
Part time instructors won't be paid for teaching the day class, save the evening programme, one of the reasons for the changes.
Dr George W. Lugalambi, head of Mass Communication department told third year students the adjustments have been made necessary due to changes in the staffing policy, which has to do with shortage of instructors and insufficient funding.
In an earlier communication to the Mass Communication staff and students, Dr Lugalambi noted, "This decision has been forced on us by the staffing gaps that the department is experiencing. But, we believe it is better to find a way to continue running these classes under schedules that some may find inconveniencing than to cancel them altogether."
And indeed, inconveniencing have the changes begun to prove especially to most third year day students, who have to religiously attend some lectures that end at 9pm. Where possible, some have decided to avoid taking and registering such course units that have been merged and run late into the night. Others are promising to attend as few evening lectures as possible, since they feel uncomfortable readily adjusting to the improvised schedules, albeit reportedly temporary.
One such student is Diana Nabiruma, who freelances with The Weekly Observer. It would be an uphill task coming from work, tired, straight to the lecture room, unlike the conventional schedule where she could attend her day lectures and go to work where possible.
Others claim the rationale for choosing to study in the day class as from first year is because they didn't want to be in the evening class. Now, this should be their one reason to independently cut a few lectures and get away with it.
For Nelson Wesonga, "I prefer to sleep at 9pm." He therefore doesn't want to foresee a clash between his time of sleep and the time at which the last lecture ends. He is also contemplating choosing a convenient schedule that doesn't force him to study beyond 6pm or 7pm.
But Justus Lyatuu is comfortable with the changes and even says he wouldn't mind if some lectures ended at midnight. He freelances with the Daily Monitor and remarks, "The changes don't interfere with my programme. I think it is blessing to me."
Despite these 'inevitable' changes, some lectures which were merged haven't started yet. Students have been attending the lecture halls but no instructor has shown up. When one student contacted the instructor, whose identity will remain anonymous, he said he is not aware he is supposed to teach. Further still, he emphasised that the university hasn't honoured him last semester's dues for the classes he taught.
Dr. Hannington Sengendo, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts says the lecturers' or instructors' awareness on the teaching schedules is supposed to be communicated by their respective heads of department. He argues the time tables for the various departments were released in the first week, and it is the responsibility of respective faculty heads or coordinators to inform the instructors about the time tables.
However, he blames a shortfall of lecturers in the establishment for the merging of some lectures as already witnessed. He says some members are on study leave. This has adversely affected the departments like Mass Communication, Geography, Tourism and Urban Planning, which don't have established teaching structures. More than 90% of the teaching fraternity is hired on contractual basis. This exposes a visible need for more lectures, though, "We are not the appointing authority but we use contacts like heads of department to identify potential students for hire."
For the university to hire more teaching staff, Dr. Sengendo says, "It depends on how the university is facilitated."
However, he was concerned that many students are cutting lectures, despite the lecturers reporting on time. "I moved around classes today and there were no students in class. There was only one student in a Literature class I went to."
Joshua Masinde
Friday 20 February 2009
When the day students study on evening programme
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2 comments:
Dr Ssengendo should tell us "facilitated" by who?
Does he mean by the students or the state?
If it is by the students; then how come, despite clearing last semester's tuition fees, some part-time lecturers have not been paid?
If it is by the government, he should tell us whether the government is behaving like this for the first time?
If it has behaved like this before, how come in the past, except for Introduction to Politics, students of the other course units where not merged.
And the administration should tell us why they did not compel the Evening/Parallel degree programme students to attend the lectures with day students.
The way it was done, they took day students as persons who have nothing to do at night.
Thanks for the insight.
You should have heard the rumour mills the did the rounds round about last semester. Some people were alleging that the recurrent financial problems the university is in love with, and the fact that some 'interest' groups are opposed to the privatisation of the varsity, privatising all programmes, which would be taught in the evening sessions, is inevitable. I think the university management has been toying around with this idea, and they feel they were a little too late to effect the changes. What we are seeing this semester is a feasibilty test. If we don't oppose it with 'MOUs, protests, riots or other forms of discontet), they might make it the protocol.
How else will their reported 'dripping' accounts of private students' money continue to bloat foreign accounts. It is a case of pure capitalism at its best here.
Dr Sengendo meant, as soon as the university is facilitated by anonymous (read animated) sources, it might be business as usual.
And, an insight for you: Dr Sengedo told me that if you know you are in the upper second, and are interested in instructing (read without pay but for your CV's case), you can always drop in your application. I told him he should expect mine sooner than later.
Man, isn't it wonderful teaching at The Harvard of Africa!
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