Fourteen-year-old Nabyoto Veronica never knew her parents. She has lived with her aunt and uncle since she was a toddler. In fact, like many orphans in Uganda, Veronica does not even know what happened to her parents. Her relatives have never told her. But despite her lack of knowledge about her early life, this young lady seems to portray a self confidence and a poise that speaks of her determination and desire to succeed in life. Self-confidence and determination are certainly something that she will need this year as she faces the rigors of her last year in primary school.
Veronica lives in the town of Masaka in southern Uganda with her aunt, uncle, and four younger cousins. Veronica’s aunt and uncle both work long hours every day to provide a meager income for their family. Veronica’s aunt works as a cook at a nearby hotel. She awakes before sunrise to walk to work and returns home after it is already dark. Veronica’s uncle, a mechanic, works far from their home and is often gone. With her aunt and uncle working much of the time, responsibility has often fallen on Veronica to care for her four younger cousins, age 2 to 11. It is a task that she seems to enjoy. During her earlier years of primary school, Veronica used to wake early in the morning to walk to school, and then return home in the evenings to help care for the younger children and do housework.
This year, Veronica is in her final and most difficult year of primary school. All Primary 7, or P.7, students must take a very difficult and decisive exam called the Primary Leaving Exam (PLE) at the end of the school year. Those who pass will receive their Primary Leaving Certificate, and – depending on how well they perform – a place in a secondary school the next year. It is vital for students to perform well on the PLE if they wish to continue their education and procure a brighter future for themselves.
In Uganda, most people realize that their only way “out” – out of poverty, out of mediocrity, out of the country – is to get an education. But, in Uganda, education is not free. Every student must pay fees each of the three school semesters in order to remain in class and to participate in the final exams. In a country where approximately 85% of the population lives on less than $1 per day, even finding the funds to complete primary school is a grim struggle for most children.[1] The sad part is that the majority of these children are eager to learn and desperate to be in school. The lengths they will go to in order to find money for school is often astounding. They will work menial jobs or sell things in the streets for long hours, carefully saving their paltry earnings to pay their own way. Others still plead with relatives or even complete strangers to help them. The students, especially as they reach their teenage years, understand all too well the bleak life of farming and manual labor – the life of poverty - that awaits them in the future. They have watched their uneducated parents struggle through the difficulty and injustice of life to little end. These students are deeply desperate to have an opportunity to reach beyond this dismal future. They know that in Uganda the only opportunity for an underprivileged child to rise above his or her means is to get an education. Consequently, students will endure just about anything - with zeal - if it means having the opportunity to be in school.
The pressure faced by P.7 students is tremendous. The school pushes the students academically since their performance on the PLE reflects on the school. At Veronica’s primary school, all P.7 students must board on the school campus for their final year. This way, the students will be more readily available for extra classes and the school can better supervise their study time. The schedule for these P.7 students borders on the insane. Every weekday morning, Veronica begins her classes at 5:00 in the morning. (The other grades do not begin until around 8:00.) They work until 10:00 AM, at which time they get a 30 minute break. Class resumes at 10:30 and they continue studying until lunchtime at 1:00 PM. After their hour lunch break, Veronica and her classmates have more classes until 4:00 PM. They then finally get an hour for “games” before they squeeze in another hour of class prior to supper time. From 6:00 to 7:00 they eat supper, and then it is back to the classroom for more learning until 9:00 PM. Once the students are finally back in their dorms for the night, Veronica tells me that most must revise (study) for at least an hour or two before they actually go to sleep. Otherwise, they will not be able to do their homework or to retain all that they have learned and practiced in the classroom that day. Most of the students do not go to bed until 10:30 or 11:00 every night. On Saturdays, the P.7 students have class from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM. On Sundays, they must even come to class after prayers (church services) and learn until 4:00 PM. These children go to school every single day. In a week, Veronica and her classmates are required to be in school for nearly 90 hours. This excludes any time they take to revise in their free time.
Veronica does not seem fazed when asked if she thinks that she spends too many hours studying and learning each week. Her response to the question is to simply reaffirm her desire to be in school. It becomes apparent that she does not at all mind the torturous routine that she must endure every week because she is simply overjoyed to have the opportunity to even attend school. She does, however, admit to missing her family, whom she sees less now due to the fact that she boards at the school and has such a busy schedule. Veronica is lucky, however, that her aunt and uncle are supportive of her continued education. As the caretaker of the younger children, her uncle and aunt might have considered it more important for their niece to remain at home to take care of things while they worked. However, Veronica tells me that they solicited the help of another young female relative, who is not going to school, to help them at their home with the other children while Veronica is gone.
In her precious free time, Veronica loves to sing. She participates in three different choral groups associated with her church or with the project. She also helps to lead the traditional dance group of students from Hope Alive’s Masaka site. If she has any additional free time, Veronica likes to discuss school subjects with her friends or spend her time studying. Talk about dedication... or delirium - from too much time in school.
Veronica dreams of studying at the university level one day to become a doctor. She knows that her hopes for the future depend on her performance in school. Her other hope is that through her own education, she can one day help her younger brothers and sisters (cousins) to finish their education. She knows very well the difficulties that her family will face to put all of the children through school. As the eldest, Veronica not only has been given the first opportunity to finish school, but she also bears the responsibility to succeed for her family’s sake. She hopes that perhaps one day she can help them live beyond the bounds of the poverty that they know so well.
[1] UNICEF, 1995-2005 (http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/uganda_statistics.html)
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