Local governments are increasingly turning to the Teacher Effectiveness and Learner Achievement (TELA) system to monitor teacher attendance, but Ministry of Education data shows that actual attendance in many schools remains low.
Ministry figures indicate that 89 per cent of teachers in local governments where TELA has been deployed are clocking in through the system. Attendance registration is even higher in some regions, reaching 97 per cent in Teso and 94 per cent in both Bunyoro and Karamoja. However, overall attendance recorded through the system stands at only about 40 per cent, pointing to a significant gap between teachers recording their arrival at school and remaining at work throughout the day.
Speaking to our reporter, Frances Atima, the Chief Education Officer in charge of Education Standards and Quality Assurance, said the growing acceptance of TELA by local authorities was a significant milestone in the government’s efforts to eliminate teacher absenteeism through digital monitoring. “The initial rollout faced technical complaints, shortages of smartphones, network problems and widespread scepticism from local authorities, but we made sure that they understand the system and own it,” Atima said.
Atima said the directorate is now working to ensure that every public school fully adopts the platform, with all teachers required to clock in and out as prescribed. She stressed that clocking out is just as important as clocking in, because a teacher who fails to log out at the end of the required working period is automatically recorded by the system as having failed to attend work.
TELA was designed and pilot-tested in 2019 before being rolled out in March 2023. The system was introduced to permanently replace paper attendance registers, which the ministry says absentee staff had widely abused. For decades, teachers have manipulated manual attendance records by signing in retrospectively for days they missed or asking colleagues to sign on their behalf, creating artificially high attendance rates.
Teacher absenteeism is estimated to cost taxpayers up to Shs1.5 trillion annually in salaries paid for work not done. The impact on learners is equally significant. Studies indicate that, because of teacher absenteeism, a typical Ugandan pupil completes the seven-year primary education cycle having received only about four years of actual classroom instruction.
Despite the intended benefits of the digital system, its rollout has faced challenges. An audit report for the 2023/24 financial year found that TELA remained underused even after the first phase had been fully rolled out.
“Only 32 per cent of institutions, including primary schools, secondary schools, and certification-awarding institutions, are actively using the solution, despite the 100 per cent rollout of phase one of TELA,” the report states.
With local governments now increasingly embracing the system, the Directorate of Education Standards and Quality Assurance has begun training district education officers and inspectors to generate and interpret TELA reports and use the information to demand accountability from headteachers and teachers.
In a demonstration to our reporter, directorate officials showed how education officers and inspectors can remotely generate reports identifying teachers who have clocked in, those expected to be in class according to their timetables and those who have not reported for duty. The reports can be generated for a single day, an entire month or a full school term, allowing education officials to identify attendance patterns and follow up with schools where persistent absenteeism is detected.
TELA tracks attendance at different points during the day. A morning login records when a teacher reports for duty, while the timetable function compares the teacher’s presence with scheduled lessons. An evening clock-out then indicates whether the teacher remained at school for the required period.
Atima said education authorities should use the data to strengthen supervision and hold school administrators accountable for persistent absenteeism. She said headteachers should be required to explain cases where TELA data repeatedly shows teachers failing to report for duty or leaving before completing their required working hours. The ministry says it has also strengthened the system to prevent attempts to manipulate attendance records.
TELA can now detect attempts to use photographs instead of a live person during facial verification. GPS restrictions also limit clocking in and out to designated school locations, meaning teachers must record their attendance from within the approved school area rather than from home or a nearby trading centre.
The growing use of TELA, alongside evidence that actual classroom attendance remains low, has renewed calls for digital attendance data to play a more decisive role in managing the teaching workforce. Some local education officials are calling for TELA to be linked directly to the national Human Capital Management System, which could allow attendance records to be used more directly in workforce management.
“Now that the system is already at the schools and we all know how it works, it should be used to push for full attendance. We can achieve this by linking attendance to payment,” said Daniel Kayemba Weraga, an inspector of schools in Makindye-Ssabagabo, Wakiso District. The
In several local governments, accounting officers are already using TELA attendance records as evidence when taking disciplinary action or recognising good performance. The ministry’s immediate focus, officials say, is to ensure that all public schools fully adopt the system and that the attendance data generated is consistently used by education authorities to strengthen supervision and improve teacher presence in classrooms-URN. Give us feedback on this story through our email: kamwokyatimes@gmail.com
