By George Bukenya
After government gazetting of the sign language as one of the official languages used in the country, only 72 UCE candidates from 6 Centres will be writing their paper today. Of the sign language candidates, 16 are hearing learners.
According to UNEB’S Principal Public Relations Officer Jennifer Kalule, in the New Curriculum, a total of 14,300 UCE candidates will be writing their Physical Education (PE) paper in 1, 349 Centres.
As Primary Leaving Examination commence, UNEB has deployed a total of 13,000 scouts and 600 security personnel including those under cover in order to oversee the safe conducting of Examinations throughout the country.
A total of 798,771 PLE candidates have been passed through the Dos and Don’ts of UNEB this morning and the will commence writing their papers on Wednesday November 6th with Mathematics in the morning and Social Studies and Religious Education in the Afternoon while on Thursday November 7th they will be writing Integrated Science English.
Of the total number of PLE candidates, 249,408 are males and 275,282 are females who are in UPE schools, while Non-UPE is 130, 006 male and 144,075 females respectively.
The Special Needs Education Candidates totals are 3,295 of who 1677 are famales and 1,618 are males. These according to UNEB regulations will be given extra forty-five minutes and will also receive the necessary support based on their special needs.
Meanwhile Uganda Advanced Certificate of Education Examination will kick start on Friday November 8th with the briefing of candidates and writing of real papers will commence on 11th, November, 2024 and this according to UNEB’s time table will last for three weeks.
In a way of protecting and avoiding PLE candidates to contact Mpox virus, UNEB again has put on notice the head of respective centres to strictly adhere to the guidelines provided by Ministry of Health and Ministry of Education and Sports on the prevention, detection and control of the disease in schools.
“Heads of PLE Centres must adhere to the guidelines for prevention and control of Mpox as put by Ministry of Health and the line ministry through provision of clean water and soap of hand sanitizer for washing hands outside the examination hall,’’ said the UNEB’s mouth piece Kalule.
She also said although one student passed on during the start of UCE examinations, no case of Mpox have been reported in schools and the deceased candidate according to the postmortem carried out by Police died of severe malaria.