Graduation day in Kamuli

UDS has just celebrated a very special day at our Centre in Kamuli. On Tuesday 18 June our computer training students for the year 2012-2013 attended their graduation ceremony. There were 99 of them in total – 14 of them deaf.

Geoffrey Namukoye, General Manager of our centre, started the proceedings by urging the graduates to continue their computer training by investigating the extra courses the centre offers – such as graphics, programming, maintenance and networking.  

UDS Director Rita Epodoi also spoke the gathering. She thanked the graduates for their desire to pursue computer training. She gave particular thanks to the deaf students and their tutors. She also drew everyone’s attention to UDS’ new digital science for O-level programme, and urged the graduates to join the Computer Alumni Club. 

There was a special guest in the form of Ritah, a former student who trained at UDS in 2010. She is now studying bio-medical science at Makerere University. She told the graduates that she hadn’t truly appreciated the value of her computer training at UDS until she began her university studies. Then she realised how useful her computer knowledge and skills were. She added that some of her classmates find their studies hard going because they lack computer skills. Ritah concluded by urging the graduates not to take their training lightly - it’s something that will help them improve their lives. 

Mr Kayabya, our oldest student, receives his certificate

Another guest was Mr Mugote, a blind man who manages to use computers despite his disability. He paid tribute to the organizers of the UDS project, whom he described as “great thinkers”. The community should be lucky to have these services in place and they should use them, he added.

The ceremony of handing out the certificates was conducted by the District Education Officer, Joseph Musoke. He congratulated the students, and told them they should consider themselves lucky to have acquired such valuable computer knowledge. He thanked UDS for bringing such services to the community.

It was a big day for UDS, for the graduates and for Kamuli. There was even a report on the ceremony in Uganda’s national newspaper, the Daily Monitor, recognition indeed of the importance of the work UDS is doing.

Helping Ugandan farmers to produce more food

This coming Saturday 8 June, thousands –if not tens of thousands – of campaigners are gathering at a rally in central London in a call to demand action on hunger at the G8.

The event is part of the Enough Food for Everyone…IF campaign to bring an end to hunger worldwide.

UDS farmers check pineapple crop

The IF campaign was launched earlier this year by a coalition of 100 UK development charities and faith groups, with the aim of pressuring governments to put hunger and malnutrition on the G8 agenda.

British Prime Minister David Cameron has pledged to hold a special meeting on hunger ahead of the G8 meeting of world leaders in Northern Ireland 17-18 June.

Among the demands of the IF campaign is the provision of more funds for small-scale farming. This is an area in which UDS has long been working, training subsistence farmers in better agricultural methods in order to produce crops to take to market and thus improve their income while producing more food.     

So what better time to remind you of our farmers’ appeal?