Teacher Juliana
When Action in Africa (AIA) opened The Center in Nakuwadde nearly ten years ago, Juliana Nakavuma was just another neighbor who was curious about Action in Africa and how to participate in its programs.
Nine years later Juliana, our community engagement manager, celebrates her work anniversary with Action in Africa plus an educational milestone.
Her colleagues and community feel extremely proud of her astonishing personal and professional growth as she creates life-changing impact on the Nakuwadde community.
“When I joined AIA nine years ago, there were not as many programs as there are now. Over the years, many programs have come up, and those programs have come with different roles and responsibilities.
Every year I have felt that I am growing in my career by serving in different roles. I am grateful for my career growth but I am even more fulfilled by the kind of work that I have gotten to do in my community, working with people is so satisfying. The impact I am making in people’s lives matters.”
Juliana’s first role was teaching the Adult English Class. Her view on this experience is simply that, “Teaching is not easy.” She was nearly brought to tears talking about this because of two reasons. On one side, it is truly heartbreaking that there are mothers, fathers, and grandparents who cannot read or write their names because they did not get an opportunity to go to school, but on the other hand, it is inspiring to imagine those people taking the initiative to step away from their jobs and families and spare two to three hours trying to learn English for the most heartwarming reasons.
“Before I admit a student to my class, I conduct an assessment where I ask them why they have decided to take the adult classes. Some of the responses are that these people want to be able to read and understand their children's school report cards, or be able to stand up in public and introduce themselves in English or simply be able to read documents that require them to sign and write their names. Those are some of the things that many of my students would like to do for themselves.”
Juliana has made great progress with a lot of her students, many of them can now read and write, and their goals of communicating in English have been realized. Teaching requires great patience, especially in adult education, and Juliana has demonstrated this in multiple ways.
One of the challenges with the classes is the inconsistent attendance by the students because many of them have family and work responsibilities, but Juliana sometimes offers remedial and personal classes to those who miss out. This is all because of her own experience as a student.
After high school, Juliana studied for a diploma in accounting, but this was never her passion. So when she worked with Action in Africa for a couple of years and realized how much impact she could make in her community, she decided to enroll back into university for a degree in social work and social administration.
She hesitated as she thought about balancing her studies, the cost of higher education, her work at AIA, and her responsibilities as a wife and mother. Plus she had just given birth at the time, but she was not going to let anything stop her.
“The work I was doing with Action in Africa inspired me to go back for further studies. When I was informed about the AIA Professional Development of the Staff Program where I could get financial support to go back to university, I did not let that opportunity pass me by.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, I applied and was admitted to Ndejje University for their weekend program. I then wrote to the AIA top management and they committed to providing three-quarters of my tuition. I was very nervous but my ambition was re-energized when I excelled in my first exams.
I knew that I could do this.
Family, work, and school, it is not easy for anyone. It has not been so easy for me either. I had to be very resilient and determined. One of my greatest motivations was that I wanted to be a good example for my kids, I would even be accountable to them by showing them my results.
One time I showed my son a printout of my results and I had a “C” in one of my exams, he asked me, ‘Mummy how did you fail this, weren't you attending the classes?’ just like what I always ask him when I am not happy with his performance in class.
“I had already told my kids I would graduate this year,” Juliana said. “I used it as motivation for them to be inspired. I wanted them to be engaged so that they knew that every time mummy was not home on the weekend, it was because she was studying. Now that I am done with my degree, I am very excited to graduate on October 11th.”
In her role as a community engagement manager, Juliana advances one of Action in Africa's core principles: that of community-led initiatives.
“In all our activities, we engage and work closely with the community, one such activity is our bi-annual medical outreach, where we provide free health services to the people in the community,” Juliana said.
These have always been successfully organized by Juliana as she coordinates local government administrators and medical service providers to conduct the medical outreach events. And more importantly, her efforts are warmly accepted by the community, oftentimes the kids that visit our The Center pulling in their parents behind them.
