Education system, limited digital tools slow down persons with visual impairment

Uganda doesn’t have a mobile communications accessibility policy framework, or a specific web accessibility policy for PWDs, according to the 2017 ICTs for Disability Policy.

Bazil Onen mainly got his digital skills training from the charity that employed him. He suggests that government should draft a policy that supports children with visual impairment, who are interested in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Maths (STEM) related subjects.

“Most of the policies we have were set years back when no one had any precise idea how the learners with visual impairment could become scientists or a software developer like I am,” says Onen.

He suggests that the government should start making wide-sweeping policies that legislate protection and also leverage government investment in assistive technology for persons with visual impairment, instead of concentrating only on mainstream ICT laboratories.

“The government should invest heavily in assistive technology. It is sad, because probably from 2013, the government has been building ICT infrastructures in schools, but they are only focused on the mainstream ICT laboratory.”

“The government has a full commission for special needs at the ministry of education and sports and every school that I know that has an annex for learners with visual impairment, whatever they have in regards to ICT are products of donations, which is a shame, an absolute shame. It is an act of open discrimination but nobody is talking about it,” he says.

In 2020, the Ministry of Gender Labour and Social Development came up with a National Child Policy, promising to give children with special education needs appropriate learning aids, such as reading glasses, Braille materials, and appropriate ICT equipment and software. However, this policy is yet to fully take off.

Although the government gives each University student with visual impairment $396 (about UGX 1.4 million) for buying a brailler, Awucu says the money is not only inadequate but also does not support them in the unavoidable shift in digital learning.

“If they could give money for a computer, it would be better. University is full of research work and a brailler cannot [help one] do research,” says Awucu.

A 2018 study on Access and Utilisation of ICT by students with visual impairment in Public Universities in Uganda showed that while 60% knew that their university had an e-learning platform, they had never downloaded any learning materials from their university’s website.

Awucu also thinks some of these challenges could be solved by parents and relatives, if they believed in their children with visual impairment.

The big problem we have is from our parents. They have a negative attitude towards children with disabilities and neglect them even if they can afford to educate them,” says Awucu.

“I talk from experience because when I still had my sight, my relatives were supportive. In all ways. But when I lost my sight, they abandoned me and even stopped calling just to check on me.”

Awucu lost both parents at a young age and was abandoned by his cousin at an eye clinic when the doctor said he would never see again. He has stayed in three different homes of people not related to him.

He suggests that government should massively sensitize parents on the need to treat every child equally, adding that he would not be at the university if he wasn’t helped by outsiders.

According to the Children’s Act Amended in 2016, chapter 59, part II, subsection (j); every child shall be treated without discrimination of any kind, irrespective of his or her dis/ability among other characteristics or conditions, but implementation is lacking.

Bazil Onen says the lack of digital skills opportunities both at home and at school, greatly affect their chances of children with visual impairment studying well and getting good grades.

“If all the kids who have visual impairment can’t read as hard or as much, then they won’t pass as well, then they cannot compete with everybody. And as a result, most of the kids that I know who have a visual impairment, because they cannot access materials, get low grades and because of low grades, they set out for less competitive careers because that is what their small grades can afford them,” says Bazil Onen.

Onen argues that ICT just makes work easy for persons who can see, but for them, ICT makes things possible.

“Think of it like this; if you are sighted, I think ICT makes things easy. If you have a visual impairment, it’s not just for making things easy, it’s for making things possible,” says Onen.

“If you want to bring kids through the education system and they cannot use a computer then you are preparing them for a world that is long gone. They are not getting a job anywhere. And I think the employer would be right not to choose them because they just cannot deliver,” says Onen.

The 2020 situational analysis of PWDs shows that only 5 percent of the 2.5 million children with disabilities have access to education through an inclusive setting and 10 percent through special schools and annexes. Meaning, the rest lack adequate funding, fair mainstreaming, and improved quality of schools tailored towards their needs.

Onen says he qualified to study Law on government sponsorship, but after seeing the beauty of a computer in his life, he chose to study Social Works and Social Administration, to enable him help have frequent interactions with people with visual impairment. He now works full-time translating online materials into formats easily accessible to persons with visual impairment.

Charles Byekwaso, the executive director of Uganda National Association of the Blind, claims four years ago, the association used to train students who had sat for senior six exams to prepare them for the life of research-filled education ahead, but they now lack funds.

He advises learners with visual impairment to have to think of other income-generating activities such as farming when they fail to get a job they are trained in.

Sarah Ayesiga, the assistant commissioner for inclusive and non-formal education in the Ministry of Education and Sports, says the Universities have always assured them that learners with disabilities are accessing resources online.

“The Universities have been assuring us that they have catered for those learners and we were asking them that these learners are scattered everywhere and some of them might not even be having internet. But I can assure you, they have been assuring us that they are doing everything possible to give these learners the information that they need.”

“If there are complaints then it is good you told us. We can go to National Council for Higher Education to stage some complaints and petition that if these learners at the university level are not accessing the online materials, and other virtual online systems, then it is unfortunate,” she says.

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 ✳ This reporting was supported by Media Monitoring Africa (MMA) as part of the Isu Elihle Awards.