A case study of curriculum review in hydrology and water resources engineering

Stakeholders and industry expressed concern at the lack of interest by many students in taking up careers in hydrology and water resources engineering . This was partly attributed to the limited extent of coverage in the courses offered in Department of Civil Engineering at Makerere University. This paper discusses how with the assistance from an industry based engineer, a new curriculum was designed that would reflect the requirements of industry and would compare favourably with any other course nationally and internationally. It also demonstrates new methods in teaching learning and assessment that supported the new curriculum. Reports from both the external examiner and stakeholders were very encouraging about the standard achieved. It suggests that curriculum revision should be a regular and should involve stakeholders

NURP water and sanitation component

NURP water and sanitation componen

Rural water service delivery and innovations in Uganda

This study seeks to improve the delivery of rural water services in Uganda by understanding the key challenges and bottlenecks that are currently confronting service delivery and to identify innovative approaches, which may be piloted. A combination of household questionnaires, semi-structured household interview questions, the qualitative information systems methodology for focus group discussions, field observations as well as key informant interviews were employed to gather the necessary data. A set of 16 water user groups and committees (WUC) s were mobilized in each of the 8 districts from northern and western Uganda, and a random selection of 1600 households. The results showed a well-functioning water user committee and collection of the user fee is a prerequisite to safe and reliable water supply. Furthermore, the creation of a savings group which engaged in other economic activities made the WUC more sustainable and its adoption was thus recommended

Rainwater harvesting in Uganda

Rainwater harvesting in Ugand

Competency based education and training (CBET): a case study in Uganda

This paper describes how the Ministry of Education and Sports embarked on reforming business technical and vocational education and training in Uganda by introducing Competency Based Education and Training. It explains how skeleton Uganda Vocational Qualification Framework UVQF, secretariat was created .UVQF which developed with stakeholders occupational profiles and standards, assessment instruments, modularized curricula and test items. It explains benefits to the water and sanitation sector together with the challenges and recommends a way forward

Training for real: starting in the University

Graduates of Engineering in Uganda face great challenges in the work place as they are expected to be fully prepared to start work with little or no further training. In view of this, training has to begin at the University, where it has been found that the quality of teaching is poor, by admission of the lecturers themselves. This paper reports on an initiative by Uganda Martyrs University to systematically analyse the nature of teaching in the Faculty of Building Design, and to design, develop, implement and evaluate an intervention in the form of training to equip lecturers with basic teaching skills. It is hoped that this will in turn increase the chances of students being trained for real

Training of engineering students through district-focused internship attachments

Rural areas of Uganda have been experiencing a shortage of adequately trained district technical staff. Many graduate engineers are unwilling to offer their services to the rural areas. Furthermore, those that eventually go to the rural areas are ill prepared and are not readily accepted by the district staff. This has resulted in the inadequate capacity for the technical management of the district’s needs. In order to address this situation, Makerere University with support of Rochfeller Foundation initiated a Pilot Project. Eleven civil engineering students were trained in a pilot district for a period of seven weeks. The training was done on a week rotational basis around the different departments of the district of local government. This paper describes the development of the pilot project and the experience of the students, the districts and staff of Makerere together with the lessons learned and the way forward

Course transfer - a tripod capacity building approach

This paper presents Capacity Building (CB), Technical Assistance (TA) and Partnership Building (PB) as key elements to successful knowledge transfer, in this case course transfer. Water Supply and Sanitation for Low Income Communities course was transferred from WEDC in UK to UMI in Uganda. On the basis of the case, a Tripod Model is advanced as key to successful implementation of course transfer. The paper recommends CB at the local level instrumental to sustainability of course transferred especially when external support ceases

Scaling up school sanitation

The paper outlines the various initiatives undertaken in Uganda to scale up school sanitation. The main strategies employed were; appropriate macro-economic policies,increased funding and stakeholder involvement at the lowest level It starts with the Sanitation Baseline Survey that provided important information for planning the interventions.It then describes the institutional reforms, that created an enabling environment to proceed with the interventions. The two UNICEF Programmes are then discussed, followed by the School Facilities Grant and the RUWASA Programme.Key issues relating to latrine construction, hand washing facilities, behavior change, the girl child, the disabled are highlighted together with the overall impact of these interventions. Conclusions are then drawn and a way forward, recommended

Design of a modified dry toilet ventilation systems to accelerate drying

A study was carried out to develop a modified ventilation system to accelerate drying, which would be useful in shortening the retention period required before faecal matter can be rendered safe for handling. This would result in smaller units and reduced overall costs. The data analysed showed that all the Ecosan systems were operating on natural ventilation, but often with a number of shortcomings such as small vent pipe diameters as well as, improper and weak materials. It was concluded that a minimum vent pipe diameter of 150mm is required for efficient ventilation and better results could be obtained by incorporating a rotary vent turbine. The rate of drying in the vaults could be further increased by the use of one-way glass for the vault covers and insulating the walls, to optimise direct sunlight and minimize heat loss. These conditions are very important, if accelerated drying is to be realised