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There is a dearth of phenomenological interpretive studies in public-private partnership (PPP) policy in education service delivery. The limited extant literature on PPPs in education hardly explores insights into how stakeholders understand them, and what they perceive as critical success factors (CSFs) for their implementation in the context of developing countries. The overarching purpose of this study is to explore the stakeholders' perceptions of PPP policy in universal secondary education (USE) and its CSFs in Uganda. It employed the interpretive paradigm and the participants were purposively selected from government bodies, partnership private schools and local communities. Document review and interviews were used as the data collection methods while the resultant data were analyzed using content and thematic techniques. The findings reveal that most stakeholders' understandings of the PPP in USE were diverse and context-specific; and that most school-based stakeholders implemented this policy without clearly understanding its origin, goals and guidelines. While most government-based stakeholders perceived the policy as successful, the majority of school-based stakeholders deemed it unsuccessful. The majority of stakeholders perceived regular policy reviews, commitment to partnership roles, sufficient funding, the selection of partners with adequate capacity, effective policy communication, regular policy monitoring and strong enforcement mechanisms as its CSFs. In view of the findings, it can be inferred that unless appropriate policy reforms and best practices informed by these findings are undertaken, the success and sustainability of PPP policy in USE would remain uncertain.

Kyambogo University (KyU) is one of the nine government universities in Uganda experiencing gender inequalities with glaring development implications in the country with 34.6 million people (UBOS, 2016) in which women are the majority. The central aim of the paper is to establish the gender imbalances in Kyambogo University and development implications with a specific focus on policies, facilities, and services for students and then provide the way forward. This study used a mixed-methods approach that combined desk reviews and interviews (Creswell et al., 2017). The findings indicate that nature is reflected in the admissions, completion, science and engineering programmes and student leadership while the development implications are colossal in terms of imbalances in Kyambogo University dropouts, Student Leadership, Higher Degree Achievements, returns to education, and lose of Self-Esteem. In conclusion, it is now clear that gender imbalances in KyU is a reality and this paper recommends promoting gender equality by all stakeholders majorly through the KyU Gender Mainstreaming Directorate, and through the establishment and operationalization of KyU Gender Policy, Anti-Gender Violence Policy, Gender Responsive Budgeting, STEM Programme, and Gender Monitoring and Evaluation.

This paper seeks to identify the factors that explain how members of parliament improved budget scrutiny using unique empirical data collected in Uganda. Two instances are studied that mark the improvements. First, the 2001 Budget Act that established the Parliamentary Budget Committee with large competencies for African standards. Second, the change in the 2012 Health Budget, a rare instance when parliament made significant budget amendments. The analysis reveals that political entrepreneurs used a window of opportunity to build a coalition for change. The window of opportunity opened at an event organised by civil society. The process that followed improved legislative budget scrutiny in a country with strong executive systems and strong patronage. Two factors have proven influential that are understudied in the current literature, civil society and female members of parliament. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: HIV/AIDS prevalence in Uganda is beginning to show an upward trend despite increased inflow of funds to fight HIV/AIDS in Uganda., Objectives: To monitor health sector financing from an HIV/AIDS perspective so as to produce recommendations for effective health service delivery mechanisms in Uganda, Methods: We reviewed the literature and conducted key interviews with service users, policy makers and HIV/AIDS program managers at national and local government levels. Thematic and content analysis guided the presentation of results., Results: While efforts have been put in place to meet its national minimum health care package, much of the support in HIV/AIDS is from donors and NGOs. There is still no clear harmonisation of funding mechanisms and big short fall in health sector budgeting especially at local government level. At this rate Uganda may not achieve its targets, Conclusion: HIV/AIDS funding in Uganda is largely dependant on donors. There is need for increased and sustained financing from the government if the impact of HIVAIDS is to be reduced.