Parents’ willingness and ability to pay for UPE extra charges in Nazigo village, Kayunga District

Abstract

UPE was established to provide free education services for especially the children from poor families that cannot afford to pay school fees for their children. However, the policy came in place with government funding that did not include some facilitations like school feeding. Using a case study of Nazigo Village in Kayunga district in this study, for proper functioning of the UPE schools, extra funding is needed from the community/ parents so as to complement government funds that are insufficient to fully run the UPE schools. The aim of my research was to identify the willingness of parents to pay for these extra charges, their attitudes and perceptions towards the extra charges because this situation comes with different outlooks and points of view. This study also explores the ability of parents to the pay for them as well as different coping strategies employed by the parents to meet the costs of the extra charges they are to pay to the UPE schools. A quantitative research approach was used with research designs that were exploratory and descriptive to answer the research questions. Data was collected using methods of Key Informant Interviews and In-depth interviews from respondents who were selected using purposive sampling methods. Findings were presented showing parents are unwilling because of the mentality that government is to fully fund the UPE schools. The attitudes of the parents were also discovered as negative because of the same mentality of government aid. Furthermore, parents were discovered to be unable to pay the extra charges because of poverty. Coping strategies employed are majorly alternative business ventures and loan associations to raise money to pay the extra charges for UPE.