Students from different learning institutions clear the heap of rubbish near the well. PHOTO/PAUL ADUDE
What you need to know:
- The skills, he says, will expose learners to the real challenges affecting society in order to transform their communities back home.
The Vice Chancellor University of Kisubi Bro Deogratious Mugema is calling on students to adopt service learning as part of their education, while at the university, to move beyond theoretical classroom learning and apply their knowledge.
The skills, he says, will expose learners to the real challenges affecting society in order to transform their communities back home.
“It is not merely a tradition to do community cleaning, but as a value that calls us to serve our communities, because it is the right thing to do. We gathered around the Kawuku community well, participated in the community sensitisation and cleaned the well,” he said.
He added, “We are stewards, what we see around, the land, buildings, schools, …, even the house where we are staying, it belongs to the whole community, we are called upon to take care of all these properties and protect them, so that the next generation will be able to enjoy the same as we are enjoying”.
Bro Mugema’s call came as students took part in a cleaning up exercise of Kawuku Community well, which serves more than 1,500 households in Sissa, Katabi Town Council, last week.
The vice chancellor said the programme is also informed by the Catholic tradition of service and care for creation, following Pope Leo XIV’s September 2026 prayer intention on “the care of water, in which he called for attention to water as a universal gift and a right without borders; encouraging people to protect it with gratitude, justice and responsibility.
“This provides an important spiritual and educational foundation for connecting academic formation with service to communities and care for creation. Service-Learning consequently becomes a bridge between knowledge and action, with students not only learning about problems but learning with communities and contributing to solutions” he said.
He added, “Even where piped water is available, the community well remains an important alternative source, it’s safety, therefore, concerns us all…. What we receive from our communities, we have a responsibility to protect, defend, and promote” he said.
The coordinator service learning programme at the University of Kisubi Bro Dr Bernard Luwerekera, said the initiative is aimed at deconstructing the belief that learning only takes place in the classroom.
“Just on the side of the well, you have a terrible dumping site, we hope that the contribution we have made to the community can also be a lesson to the community,” he said.
The Kisubi-kawuku village chairperson Mr Steven Calvin Mutyaba said the safety of the water at the well had been endangered by a few residents and garbage truck operators.
“We’re not only going to protect the well, but also sensitise people on the importance of the well and negative effects of dumping rubbish near the well like contamination, from which hundreds of households fetch water for domestic use,” he said.