Factors associated with school dropouts in universal primary education schools in Uganda

Abstract

The objective of this study was to assess factors associated with school dropout in Universal Primary Education (UPE) in Uganda. This was motivated by fact that while Uganda was one of the first African countries to introduce Universal Primary Education (UPE) in 1997, it is still faced with a number of challenges including high dropout rates and non-attendance. For instance, the recent UNHS 2016/17 shows that 12 percent of school-going age children have never attended while 48.2% have dropped out of school. Using UNHS 2016/17 and employing Microsoft word, excel and STATA software packages, the study examined the effect of parental related factors, school related factors and community related factors on the likelihood of a school-going age child dropping out of school. The analysis was done using the marginal effects after estimating the logistic regression model. The study findings reveal that the main factors associated with school dropout in Uganda are; the gender of the pupil, age of the pupil, distance from home to school, presence of parent, sex of household head, level of education of the household head, poverty status of the household, total expenditure on education.