Article by Vivian Glyck

Education in Uganda – Is Education Really the Best Medicine for Poverty?The shortest distance out of poverty is not a hand out for food, clothing or shelter. If you want to support an entire community to become self-reliant, commit to establishing their education system.

We have so many educational issues in the US, why do we care that Ugandan children don’t have schools or that their children cannot go to the ones that do exist?

The more education a nation receives, the more globally responsible they become. When you teach a child how to become something, anything, you teach her to expect more. Expect more from herself. Expect more from her community. Expect more from life. You create an internal gauge of accountability. With accountability comes contribution. If we want our children to be responsible, contributing members of society, what do we do? We teach them how, we teach them why and we expect them to deliver.

Imagine a world in which we no longer have to pour millions of dollars into malaria treatments or HIV treatments? It is possible. It is possible through education in Uganda. If we want to reduce the amount of financial support the US provides other countries, we need to invest in education, our own and theirs.

In a recent New York Times article by Celia W. Dugger http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/09/world/africa/09safrica.html more focus is being put on education and low-fee schools in Africa to serve the underserved and they are seeing great results. These Leap schools are described as bare-bones private schools tucked away in abandoned factories, shopping centers, shacks and high-rises. What makes them a key element in the effort to combat poverty is the schools instill more than a fierce work ethic. Each day, students have a life orientation class, or L.O. as they call it, where they talk about the personal problems that can derail an educationâ