[NYTr] Ugandan Science Scholarships Tilt Against Women

Mon Jul 23 16:55:31 EDT 2007

Womens eNews - Jul 23, 2007
http://www.womensenews.org

Ugandan Science Scholarships Tilt Against Women

By Anna S. Sussman
WeNews correspondent

KAMPALA, Uganda (WOMENSENEWS)--Just off the main road heading out of
Uganda's capital is a ramshackle cinderblock building, the Kitetikka
High School. In an unpainted science lab with no electricity and no
running water, students study from yellowing textbooks.

They are eager to excel in science because of a recent announcement
that most of the government's university scholarships each year will go
to students in the sciences. Now, about 53 percent of government
scholarships are reserved for science students, a major boost from 13
percent before the science preference policy.

For these low-income students, most of whom come from households
earning less than $1 a day, government scholarships are their only hope
for attending university.

But education advocates such as the Forum for African Women
Educationalists, say the new scholarship policy will further restrict
the number of women going to university because of cultural biases
against girls in science here.

Kitetikka student Ritah Nanteza, for instance, wants to be a surgeon.
But friends of the 16-year-old say she shouldn't even try.

"Girls' minds aren't good at science," one of Nanteza's friends told
Women's eNews. Even her teacher agrees. "Girls don't have the same
capacity for sciences that boys do," said Francis Mulumba, a science
teacher at the school.

"The girls in my classes have never performed as well as the boys. Some
of it is cultural, some of it is mental and some of it is biological,"
he said.

Mulumba's assessment of girls in science is widely held across Uganda,
and the statistics reflect it. Women make up only a tiny percentage of
science students at the major universities. And girls' test scores are
consistently lower than boys, with the widest performance gap in the
sciences, according to the Kampala-based Association of Women
Engineers, Technicians and Scientists in Uganda.

Emphasis on Science in Schools

While a scarcity of girls in sciences is not unique to Uganda, the
combination with the government's new preference for science students
could have particularly grave effects on young women's education.

Before the science preference policy, about 37 percent of government
merit scholarships were awarded to women. This year that fell to 29
percent, according to the Ugandan Ministry of Education and Sports.

Major universities have already dramatically rolled back their
admissions in non-science departments. "It simply means there are fewer
options for girls to go to university," says Dorothy Muhume, the
forum's program officer. "The prejudice against girls in science is
very real here, and now it means that girls will not be going to
university."

The government already awards female students an additional one and a
half points on their final exams to counteract the social obstacles
they face in school. But the Uganda chapter of the Africa-wide Forum
for African Women Educationalists is suggesting that further points be
awarded in response to the new science policy.

"Because we are seeing a drop in the number of female scholarship
recipients, it would make sense that affirmative action be taken in
response to this new development," said Martha Muhwezi, a technical
advisor to the forum in Uganda.

At Kitetikka High School, 18-year-old Herbert Kikiwambanga summed up
the feeling among students. "Science is very difficult work, too
difficult for the mind of a girl, that is why doctors are only men," he
said.

Other students, both male and female, nodded in agreement.

Doing Science and Housework

Ritah Nanteza, however, is determined to succeed. She struggles daily
to overcome the skepticism about her mental abilities, but she also
faces logistical challenges.

"Our time for studying is very limited because as girls we have a lot
of housework," she says. "It is very difficult to find the time to
study things like sciences and math. That is why we are told to leave
it for the boys."

Housework is one of the primary reasons for girls' poor performance in
Ugandan schools, says Muhume. They are expected to perform hours of
cooking, cleaning, washing clothes by hand and fetching water, often
from more than five miles away.

In rural areas, where cultural biases against girls are more deeply
entrenched and housework much greater, the science gap is even more
pronounced, she says.

Muhume says the new science policy compounds the already profound
challenges to a girl's academic success here. The forum is promoting
education campaigns to counteract the discouragement that girls like
Nanteza face.

"I think the key is to educate parents," says Proscovia Njuki. She was
the first woman in East Africa to graduate with a degree in
engineering, and she founded the Association of Women Engineers,
Technicians and Scientists in Uganda to address the scientific gender
gap.

'Static Gender Notions'

"In Uganda, especially in rural areas, the notions of gender are very
static. Parents and teachers discourage girls from sciences because
they fear it will make a girl child unattractive, and she will not be
able to marry," she said. "That is a very big deal here, especially for
poor families. There is a perception that a woman scientist is no
longer a woman, and therefore no man will want her as a wife."

Now, Njuki is the Africa coordinator for the Gender Advisory Board of
the Geneva-based United Nations Council on Science, Technology for
Development. She tours Uganda speaking to schoolgirls about careers in
science.

"One of the first things I tell them is that I am married. And you can
tell, it immediately makes them much more comfortable. It's probably
the most important thing they learn from me, that women can be
scientists and still have a husband."

She says she has seen girls heckled and booed in high school science
classes.

"I was teased too," she says "I was one woman in a class of 40 men at
university. Professors would yell at me for asking too many questions,
one of them would always yell 'women!' in disgust," she says, laughing.

Although her family teased her for pursing a profession that would
result in her "wearing pants" and "working outside," Njuki has
encouraged her daughters to pursue science.

In an indication of parents' ability to help turn the key on Uganda's
nationwide lockout of girls from science, Njuki's youngest daughter is
studying mechanical engineering at Uganda's prestigious Makerere
University. Entering high school, Njuki says with pride, her daughter
was the top-ranked science student in the country.

[Anna S. Sussman is a print and radio journalist. She currently lives in
Uganda.]

For more information:

Women's eNews series, "Africa's Women Crack Open Its Universities": -
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/3062

Forum for African Women Educationalists: -
http://www.fawe.org/home/index.asp

Association of Women Engineers, Technicians and Scientists in Uganda: -
http://www.wougnet.org/Profiles/wetsu.html