Uganda Christian University (UCU) made valuable impact at the St. Joseph’s Senior Secondary School, Naggalama’s Inter-University Exhibition and Symposium on June 15^th, 2024. UCU students and faculty showcased a diverse range of innovative prototypes and projects, impressing students, teachers, and dignitaries alike.

Among the innovations at the UCU stall were clean cooking solutions, multimedia projects including podcasts, virtual reality adventures, innovative renewable energy, and material solutions, among others.

The event’s Guest of Honour, Mr. George Mutekanga, Assistant Commissioner in Charge of Private Schools and Institutions, praised UCU for its commitment to transformative education.

“What UCU students have exhibited today is a true reflection that you are going in the right direction. We need to produce graduates who can innovate and create employment,” he commended.

Mutekanga was particularly impressed by the innovative projects on display, including papercretes and aluminum strips pavers.

He extended an official invitation to UCU to participate in the upcoming Bukalasa Agricultural Show, a testament to the university’s exceptional work.

The UCU team was also honoured to provide career guidance to the students, inspiring and motivating them to pursue their passions.

About Uganda Christian University (UCU)

Uganda Christian University (UCU) is a private, Christian university whose main campus is located in Mukono, Uganda.

Founded in 1997, it is one of the top-ranked universities in Uganda, and is accredited by the Uganda National Council for Higher Education.

Through our vibrant Schools and Faculties, UCU offers a wide range of undergraduate and graduate programmes across various disciplines, including business; computer science; education; law; medicine; dentistry; engineering; visual arts and design; nursing; agricultural sciences; social sciences; journalism, media and communication; and theology, among others.

Compiled by: Irene Best Nyapendi

Edited By: Harriet Adong, Consultant at UCU’s Communication and Public Relations Department

To address Kampala’s pressing waste management challenges, Uganda Christian University (UCU) is pioneering working on and rolling out innovative solutions. Specifically, UCU is working through its research spearheaded by Dr. Ssepuuya Geoffrey from the Department of Food Science and Nutrition in the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences,

The initiative focuses on converting food waste into animal feed, offering a sustainable answer to the city’s enduring garbage problem.

Despite authorized garbage collectors managing to collect 28,000 tons of waste every month, this only accounts for 40% of Kampala’s total waste. “In Kampala, we only collect 40% of the waste,” noted Dr. Ssepuuya. This leaves 60% of waste uncollected, worsening the city’s waste management crisis and contributing to environmental degradation and other public health concerns.

In response to this challenge, UCU’s innovative Food Waste-to-Cricket Feed research aims to revolutionize waste management practices in the city.

The initiative involves distributing specially designed garbage cans to participating households, enabling efficient organic waste collection where each household receives two cans: one designated for boiled food waste and the other for raw food scrap.

This method not only facilitates effective waste management but also converts waste into valuable cricket feed, providing a sustainable solution for waste disposal while promoting environmental conservation.

The conversion process offers a dual benefit: reducing the volume of waste that ends up in dumpsites and producing a high-protein feed for crickets, which are a sustainable source of protein for animal feed and human consumption.

UCU’s Garbage Can Initiative: A Step Towards a Cleaner, Kampala

Vanecio Masereka, who works for Marie Royal Hotel, has requested additional trash cans, emphasizing the program’s significance.

“The two cans we have are not enough, yet they serve a great purpose,” he explained. “Having more cans would help us manage our waste more effectively and contribute to the sustainability efforts.”

Kisaakye Suzan, a resident of Makindye division, has embraced this practice and highlights its potential benefits for her community and beyond.

“They increase our flexibility since the organic foods that add weight to our garbage are taken free of charge,” she shared. “It not only helps us manage our waste better but also supports the environment.”

Patrick Kamya, a restaurant attendant, appreciates the service as it enables him to sort his garbage efficiently and gain insights into food consumption patterns.

“It enables me to know how much food is being consumed or how much food is being littered,” he noted. “This helps us reduce waste and manage our resources better.”

Peace Suubi, an apartment resident, also values the initiative for its economic and environmental benefits.

“UCU giving us garbage cans reduces the costs charged by the garbage collecting companies and increases cleanliness in the surrounding area,” Suubi said.

Dr. Ssepuuya and his team are committed to expanding the program and refining the waste-to-feed process. They aim to create a scalable model that can be implemented across the city and eventually the entire country.

“By converting organic waste into valuable resources, we can address multiple challenges simultaneously: waste management, food security, and environmental sustainability,” Ssepuuya said.

The UCU research team is also collaborating with local authorities and community leaders to ensure the program’s success and scalability. The initiative is part of a broader effort to promote sustainable practices and raise awareness about the importance of waste management and environmental conservation.

As more residents and businesses participate in the program, the collective impact will contribute to a cleaner, healthier, and more sustainable Kampala.

The waste management innovation is funded by UCU and the European Union through the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology.

Compiled By: Irene Best Nyapendi

Edited By: Harriet Adong, Communication and PR Consultant at UCU.

By Pauline Luba
Mushin Nsubuga spent a large part of his childhood with his grandmother, who was a nursing assistant. During the day, the grandmother would vend bananas and then turn to hospital work for the night shift. As such, the hospital environment had a lot of influence on Nsubuga’s future. It’s no wonder that he became a doctor.

At the time, Nsubuga’s mother was operating several businesses to earn a living for the family. His father was in Libya, studying Islam.  

Since Nsubuga’s grandmother professed the Christian faith, it is to the church that she took her grandson every Sunday, for worship at the Sunday school. No one, not even Nsubuga’s grandmother, ever imagined what that innocent act would have on Nsubuga, a Muslim, who eventually started professing the Christian faith.

Upon his father’s return from Libya, he sent his son away from home, protesting his change of faith. 

“I was chased away from home for owning a Bible,” said Nsubuga, who is married, with four biological children, and another in the process of being adopted. “My father could not accept my new religion,” 

Eventually, Nsubuga returned home, but a cold relationship with his father would continue, until he was 18 years. It was at that time that Nsubuga’s dad came to terms with his son’s new faith. To date, Nsubuga is a Christian. He thanks his now-deceased grandmother for taking him to Sunday school and deepening his relationship with Christ.

And it’s not just Christianity that remains engraved in Nsubuga. From what he witnessed at hospital, Nsubuga desired to be a health professional. Currently, he is a gynecologist and was early this year appointed the Executive Director of Save the Mothers East Africa.

Save the Mothers was created when Dr. Jean Chamberlain Froese, a Canadian obstetrician/ gynecologist, was confronted with mothers in need. As a volunteer with the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Canada and the Association of Obstetricians of Uganda, she discovered many of the causes of maternal death went far beyond medical barriers.

As a result, Dr. Froese worked with Ugandan colleagues — Dr. Florence Mirembe, Dr. Pius Okong, and Olive Sentumbwe- Mugisa — and founded Save the Mothers (STM). In 2005, STM launched its first program, Master of Public Health Leadership, at Uganda Christian University (UCU).

Nsubuga’s interest in maternal and child health, as well as the decision to specialize in obstetrics, came from his encounter with patients during his internships as a student. He says he witnessed some expectant women failing to buy delivery kits that they were expected to turn up with in hospital as they went into labor. Resources were so scarce at the hospital that women were often asked to buy gloves for the delivery of their babies, an option few could afford.

One day, Nsubuga remembers a woman walking into the health facility with no gloves, and no money. He says he and his colleagues raised funds to ensure a safe delivery for the woman. 

Nsubuga delivered countless mothers of their babies while still in Gulu, and he says it broke his heart how much suffering some women had to go through at that time. This prompted him to specialize in obstetrics, to get a chance to permanently help expectant women as a profession.

He believes God’s grace even favoured him as he highly passed the obstetrics course without much challenge during his studies.

He attended Nakivubo Blue Primary School, Katikamu High School for O’level and Merryland High School for A’level. All the three schools are located in central Uganda. He then proceeded to Gulu University in northern Uganda for his Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery and then for Master of Medicine in Obstetrics and Gynecology at Makerere University.

After his undergraduate studies, Nsubuga returned to Gulu, to work in Kiwoko Hospital. While there, he says he saw many women facing challenges, with some in financial distress and others dying. One specific one stuck in his mind — a 16-year-old girl who was trying to give birth, but lost her life. 

Nsubuga’s Journey to UCU Save the Mothers

He initially didn’t think of joining Save the Mothers. However, after hearing about the search for a new executive director, he realized that to create a big impact in saving mothers, women and babies in the community, he would not be able to do it alone. One doctor can only save one patient at a time, but together with Save the Mothers, he believed that more could be done.

Nsubuga, who also works at C-Care Medical and International Diagnostic Centre in Kampala, applied for the position of Executive Director at Save the Mothers and got the job in February this year.

His task is to help the organization to stop mothers and children from dying through multidisciplinary training of individuals and to promote the safety of women in hospitals.

Currently, under his leadership, a stronger alumni network is being established, especially following the alumni meeting in May 2024, higher quality facilities are being provided to people in the postgraduate program and several projects are being implemented to help the organization realize its goals. 

When not doing work at Save the Mothers, Nsubuga is working at C Care Medical and International Diagnostic Centre in Kampala.

By Kefa Senoga
Charles Muganga, a final-year student in the Bachelor of Computer Science program at Uganda Christian University (UCU), finds himself deep in agriculture some days. Misunderstanding about what soil nutrients can yield the best crops and how data can clarify that brought him and other peers there.  

When the fertility of the garden soil is poor, farmers get low quality produce. Many working the fields devise means of increasing the productivity of the soil, such as using fertilizers to add more nutrients. To apply the necessary fertilizer, a farmer must know what nutrients are deficient and what their soils need. The smallholder farmers add fertilizers based on experience, what is available on the market or what other farmers recommend. Because of the lack of knowledge of the genetic makeup of the soil, blanket application of fertilizers can lead to wrong nutrients applied to the soil, under fertilization or overfertilization. 

Muganga and other Bachelor of Computer Science students came up with ideas that could empower farmers to increase productivity and profitability by understanding the soil data. The idea was presented at an agricultural technology event — the The Agri-Tech hackathon — hosted in Kampala in May at the Uganda Institute of Information and Communications Technology (UICT).

A hackathon is an event where, mainly computer programmers, come together to solve a problem or identify new opportunities through software programming. The May event brought together hundreds of young innovators from various universities to design digital tools that could help address critical challenges within Uganda’s agricultural sector.

“We came up with a simple testing kit with a data-driven advisory model that can test for the nutrients in the soil and advise the farmers on what kind of crops to plant,” explained Muganga, who teamed up with computer science students from other universities to develop the concept.

The agricultural technology hackathon was held in collaboration with government stakeholders including the Ministry of Information and Communications Technology and National Guidance, the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, and the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC). 

Muganga elaborated that their solution also caters to monoculture farmers who grow a single crop year after year on the same land. He described how their soil-testing kit, which is AI-integrated, can provide farmers with clear guidance, in lay language, on the most effective methods to use to continue sustaining high productivity.

“The AI is intended to avoid using technical terms such as “magnesium” and instead simplify the information for farmers. It will explain the type of manure and the quantity required in practical terms, such as recommending 50 kilograms (110 pounds) of cow dung or chicken droppings,” Muganga explained.

According to government statistics, in 2022, agriculture accounted for about 24.1% of Uganda’s Gross Domestic Product and contributed 33% of the export earnings. About 70% of Uganda’s working population is employed in the agriculture sector. 

According to Uganda’s statistics agency, the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS), between 2016 and 2020, there was an 8 percent increase in households participating in subsistence agriculture, with many more people switching to the sector during the pandemic as a result of job losses. The country also has an aging farmer profile — 55 percent of the heads of the households that practice farming are over 40 years, while 20 percent over the age of 60 years.

The solution that Muganga, as team leader, and his colleagues pitched earned them a reward of sh2.2 million (about $577).

This hackathon that focused on utilizing technology to address agricultural challenges saw the students from different schools develop digital solutions to tackle challenges in four key agricultural areas — soil health, inputs (seeds and fertilizers), value chain issues (logistics and post-harvest handling) and water management.

The digital solutions incubated at the hackathon are expected to solve key agriculture sector challenges, for instance low uptake of improved agriculture inputs, limited access to suitable financial products and low access to reliable weather information, among others.

Uganda’s Minister of State for ICT, Joyce Ssebugwawo, who attended the hackathon, said innovations, such as those pitched at the event, have the potential to offer long-term solutions for problems in agriculture.

“We must acknowledge the persistent challenges that have hindered our progress like limited access to markets for agricultural products and gaps in technology infrastructure which continue to pose obstacles to our development efforts,” Ssebugwawo said.

The next step for Muganga and other incubators is to actualize their ideas for the benefit of Ugandan farmers.

By Pauline Luba
In 1984, as Boaz Mbagaya reported back to school, he was not at peace.  His expecting mother was ill, and Mbagaya worried for the worse. That very week that the 18-year-old reported to school, he was called back home. His mother and the unborn baby had died. 

Mbagaya’s mother lost her life to complications she developed during childbirth. That incident left such an indelible mark in the life of Mbagaya that he made an immediate decision to lead the fight against maternal and child mortality. 

“We should do everything in our power to stop mothers from dying,” said Mbagaya, who grew up in a family of 16 children.

Because there were many children, most of them had to support themselves and their father, George Mbagaya, and raise money for their school fees. Boaz Mbagaya supported his father by farming and brewing local gin, which they later sold for fees.

After secondary school, Mbagaya joined Makerere University in Uganda, to pursue a course in Mental Health and Community Psychology. He pursued the Master in Public Health Leadership (MPHL) under the Save the Mothers program at Uganda Christian University (UCU) — a course that would later provide him the platform to fulfill his earlier passion for healthier expectant mothers. 

With this program, Mbagaya believed he could do something to change the narrative of the high mortality rate, especially in rural Uganda.

“The course helped me see the many challenges that the community faces,” said Mbagaya, who also studied clinical medicine at Mbale College of Health Sciences.

During the MPHL program, students would move to different geographical areas to learn about maternal needs. 

According to the Save the Mothers website, the program offers the Master of Public Health Leadership to working professionals from a wide range of disciplines, and not only the health discipline. Save the Mothers East Africa hosts the MPHL at UCU.

The program started at UCU in 2005, with the aim of training multi-disciplinary professionals and contributing to improving maternal and child health in developing countries. The students pursuing the course study on a part-time basis over two years, completing the modular program with an intensive community outreach project. 

According to the 2022 Uganda Government statistics, the Maternal Mortality Ratio is at 189 per 100,000 live births while the infant mortality stands at 34 per 1,000 live births. Globally, according to the United Nations, by 2020, there were 223 deaths per 100,000 live births.

Upon completing school, Mbagaya started a non-profit facility, the People’s Life Care Foundation, to help him promote and strengthen the health care system in Uganda. That foundation gave birth to Mbale People’s Hospital, a facility located in eastern Uganda. Mbagaya is currently the Managing Director of the facility.

Among the many outpatient and inpatient services provided at the facility is obstetrics and gynecology. Mbagaya also has broken sweat, trying to combat obstetric fistula. According to the United Nations Population Fund, obstetric fistula is a tragic childbirth injury, where a hole develops between the birth canal and the bladder and/or the rectum. It is caused by prolonged, obstructed labor without access to timely, high-quality medical treatment. 

The hospital began identifying mothers suffering from obstetric fistula for treatment. Some of the patients would even be transported to the hospital. So far, according to Mbagaya, 14 women have undergone reconstructive surgery and gotten rid of the hole. 

“There was a 51-year-old who finally got help after living with the condition for a long time,” Mbagaya said. He noted that many of the women who got medical relief had lost hope while some had lost their husbands to other people.

Barter trade
According to Mbagaya, whenever his mother got pregnant, she would offer goodies to the midwife, in anticipation for “better attention” when she went to the health facility to give birth. Mbagaya narrates that even when the health personnel visited his mother at home after delivery, she would offer them foodstuffs. It is this gesture, Mbagaya says, that, many years later, pushed him into accepting produce as exchange for services rendered at the Mbale People’s Hospital for those who do not have the money to pay the fees. 

He said he noticed how many people in the community were farmers and had produce, all of which had monetary value. Therefore, he set up a system where people, especially in the event of emergencies, could pay with produce, instead of money, which they didn’t have. As long as people put items that quantify the service they would be receiving, all would be well. This arrangement made Mbagaya popular among the people.  

“I once spent a month only eating the foodstuffs that had been offered to me in exchange for healthcare,” Mbagaya, now age 57, said.

He hopes that one day, one of his four children will also develop interest in medicine and follow in his footsteps, to ensure the legacy of the family, as well as the hospital continues.

Uganda Christian University (UCU) welcomed first-year students to its main campus in Mukono. The students were officially welcomed at an induction ceremony on Thursday May 30^th, 2024.

At the Mukono campus, the Vice Chancellor, Assoc. Prof. Aaron Mushengyezi, warmly welcomed first-year students to the institution.

“Welcome to the coolest campus, a Center of Excellence in the Heart of Africa…no doubt you have chosen the best university in Uganda because we have a good reputation, we are also known to be the most organized and cleanest campus,” said Prof. Mushengyezi.

He emphasized that UCU’s reputation precedes it, with a proven track record of producing highly employable graduates.

“UCU graduates are preferred by employers because of values, the work ethics, commitment to tasks they are given, and the values they exhibit at work,” he noted.

During the induction ceremony, the Deputy Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration, Mr. David Mugawe, also welcomed first-year students to UCU congratulating them on making the right choice.

He highlighted that UCU is unique in conducting an induction service, aimed at committing students to the Lord and ensuring a rewarding journey.

“In this country, I am not aware of a university that carries out an induction service for its new students. We do this to commit you to the Lord, believing that you shall have a rewarding journey here at UCU,” said Mr. Mugawe.

He cautioned students that, unlike high school, university life offers more freedom, but emphasized the importance of making wise choices.

“You have joined UCU where you can go out any time, choose whether to attend lectures or not…there will be no punishment except being unable to sit for exams because you have not fulfilled the requirements of attending classes,” Mr. Mugawe warned.

He also warned the students of potential temptations, including sex parties, drugs, and alcohol, but encouraged them to apply the university’s core values in their daily lives.

He reminded students of the university’s mission to equip them for productive, holistic lives of Christian faith and service, and encouraged them to access the student charter through the guild office to understand their rights and privileges.

Mr. Mugawe emphasized that UCU aims to provide a complete education and shape students into complete persons, with a focus on professionalism and character.

He urged students to maximize opportunities, develop characters that align with UCU’s values, and strive for excellence in all aspects of life.

“Whatever opportunity you have, maximize it…many have woken up in third year when it’s too late,” he cautioned.

He urged the students to adopt and maintain characters that align with UCU’s values which is; Christ Centeredness, Diligence, Integrity, Servanthood, and Stewardship.

In addition to the induction ceremony, the students also attended a weekly community worship service in the Nkoyoyo Hall. The service was themed “Character that aligns with UCU values”.

First-year students that were welcome were from the various schools and faculties including; Business, Education, Law, Agricultural sciences, Journalism, Media and Communication, Public Health, Engineering, Design and Technology among others.

The induction ceremony is one of the two special services for the students at UCU, with the second one being the commissioning ceremony.

The commissioning ceremony is held at the end of the student’s studies and marks their transition into the workforce.

Compiled by Irene Best Nyapendi

Edited By: Harriet Adong, Consultant at UCU’s Communication and Public Relations Department