The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | The Minister of Education and Sports Janet Museveni said she is happy to hear that more girls sat for the Uganda Certificate of Education-UCE exams in 2019.
According to Uganda National Examinations Board-UNEB, 169,258 girls registered and sat for the 2019 exams against 168,462 boys.
Janet Museveni said the results show that the NRM policies towards the girl child are working.
She said that in the last few years, PLE was registering more girls than boys, but this year not only more girls sat for exams at O-Level but also at the recent graduation at Makerere University had more female than male students.
“As a result of Universal Secondary Education, we have witnessed a leap in girl’s education. We have to see that girls are not only getting in school but are completing all levels of education. As we get more girls in school our society will become better and families will have a better quality of life,” Museveni said.
She, however, stressed that although they are excited about the increase in girls who are completing UCE, as a ministry they have not lost focus on the boy child. She said they are working towards achieving gender parity at all education levels.
The UNEB Chairperson Prof. Okwakol said that there are immense benefits in educating the girls. She called upon all stakeholders to make sure that this trend is maintained.
However despite more girls registering and sitting for 2019 exams, the trend in performance where the boys outshine them remains the same.
For example, 16,513 boys got first grades as compared to 11,329 girls. 32,676 boys got second grades against 37,544 girls. More girls were getting third and fourth grades and those failing than boys.
At the district level save for Iganga where 310 girls got first grades against 223 boys, in Kalungu 210 girls got the first grade against 167 boys, Kole 52 girls passed in first grade against 29 boys, Napak 11 girls got the first grade without a single boy getting one, Rukungiri with 354 girls against 140 boys and Tororo with 215 girls against 191 in the rest of the 118 districts more boys got first grades than girls.
The girls also performed poorly in science subjects such as Chemistry, Biology, Physics and only outperformed boys in the English language like it has always been the trend.
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We need to understand just how our very real, differential treatment of boys is creating the growing international male crisis, which is driving all but the very few, most supported boys/men into failure and despair. I hope we can use these very harsh variables as tools to begin helping all students and adults continually change and improve their lives by redefining our average stress as many maintained layers of mental work, not just situational or new mental, which can be slowly understood, resolved and lower over time. The biggest variable though is the archaic aggressive treatment used to make boys tough, which is killing them in many ways today.
The belief boys should be strong allows aggressive treatment from infancy to create anger and fear so they will be tough. There is less kind verbal interaction and less mental/emotional support for fear of coddling. This treatment creates high layers of average stress for boys. These layers remain in the mind taking away real mental energy from academics so they will have to work harder to receive the same mental reward. This harsh treatment creates emotional distance/distrust of others. It creates lags in communication girls are given daily. The high average stress creates activity for stress relief not genetics. The high average stress creates higher muscle tension which hurts handwriting more pressure tighter grip hurting motivation. The total effect with our false genetic models in place including less care creates more failure and feelings of hopelessness. To make it tougher for boys is granting love honor feelings of self-worth only on condition of achievement. This was designed to keep Male esteem low and be willing to give their lives in war for tidbits of love honor from society. Males not achieving are given ridicule and discipline to make them try harder. Support is not given for fear of coddling. Many boys falling behind in school turn their attention to sports and video games for small measures of love honor not received in school. The belief boys should be strong and false belief in genetics create denial of the harsh treatment which is creating the low academics low esteem and other problems boys are facing. This is not about more feelings or openness from boys; it is about society allowing aggressive treatment from infancy through adulthood so boys feel much wariness toward parents teachers others who freely use aggressive treatment for any sign of weakness. This is condoned by society. This problem is affecting all male children and adults but the lower the socioeconomic bracket and more time in lower areas the more amplified the treatment given male children by parents teachers peers.
As girls we are given much more mental emotional social physical support and care by parents teachers and peers. We enjoy a kind of reverse catharsis of much continuous care while the boys receive the opposite more hurtful treatment to make them strong. This is now killing off boys in the information age while providing girls with all of the good things. As girls we are treated much better and so enjoy more hope and support from society. Since we as girls are given by differential treatment much more continual positive – mental social/emotional support verbal interaction and care from an early age onward this creates the opposite outcome for girls when compared with boys. We receive love and honor simply for being girls. This creates all of the good things. We have lower average stress for ease of learning. We enjoy much more freedom of expression from much protection by society that makes us look more unstable at times but we can also use that same freedom of expression to give verbal silent abuse and hollow kindness/patronization to our Male peers with impunity knowing we are protected. We enjoy much lower muscle tension for ease in handwriting and motivation to write. We enjoy much more positive trust/communication from parents teachers peers and support for perceived weaknesses. We are reaping a bonanza in the information age. Now with girls and women taking over many areas of society we enjoy even more lavishing of love and honor from society while boys and men are now failing more so and are now given more ridicule and abuse by society. Mind you this is now coming from many girls and women using our still protected freedoms of expression and more so with now false feelings of superiority.
As for men earning more we need to understand boys are given love honor only on condition of achievement whereas girls are given love honor for being girls. The very few boys who are achieving highly come from more stable supported environments. They will achieve in school but they must keep “achieving highly” to keep receiving love honor from society. Those men must keep achieving and earning income over time to keep receiving love honor. As girls we are able to reach wonderful planes of innersecurity without the drug of success those very few boys must keep up in order to keep receiving love honor from society. This is creating the differences in wages whereas as a collective body women are taking over many areas of society while men are collectively failing in society and many unable compete in the information age due to “improper treatment” from infancy onward.