Text and Pictures by Peter Kasaija (Makerere University)
In partnership with SDI and AAPS, the departments of Geography, Geoinformatics and Climatic Sciences (CAES), and Architecture and Urban and Regional Planning (CEDAT) of Makerere University undertook a reality studio involving final year urban and regional planning students (as well as an architecture student) among local informal settlement communities in Uganda.
The main purpose of the exercise was to help the students bridge the gap that exists between the theoretical knowledge they have acquired with the realities facing urban centres across the country. In addition, the exercise was also crafted to help assist local slum communities in selected urban centres to generate useful information from data they had collected themselves through enumeration exercises.
With the assistance of staff & members in the National Slum Dwellers Federation of Uganda, SDI and Makerere University, the students were deployed to various urban centres where they carried out field visits and interacted with communities in slum settlements in Mbale, Jinja, Mbarara, Kabale, Arua and Kampala.
Over a period of five days in total, the different student groups visited several settlements in these centres where they made their observations, carried out simple mapping, transect walks and also engaged community leaders.
Using the enumration data and the information they collected during these visits, they returned to the university where they are now in the process of preparing reports that could be used as a basis for generating valuable information to aid local leaders and other decision-makers in Uganda.
The pictures below show the students interacting with community leaders and members in a slum settlement in Jinja, during their first field visit. On arrival in Jinja, the students had a debriefing session at the Jinja Municipal Council Headquarters, and then proceeded to one of the settlements where they met with some members of the National Slum Dwellers Federation of Uganda (NSDFU). After having a short interacting session with the leaders and other community members, they took a tour of the settlement, to gain a better understanding of the conditions of the settlement. Employing simple methods such as observation, photograhy and transect drawings, the experience helped them to appreciate their role as future agents of change. This experience was also a valuable learning experience for the community as well, since it heped to reinforce the now widely held view that they can play an equally important role in transforming their lives.
Click here to view a blogpost on the Makerere studio (from SDI Blog).
