By Irene Best Nyapendi
In September 2021, Dr. Alice Jossy Kyobutungi Tumwesigye stumbled on an advertisement that attracted her attention in the newspapers. The advertisement was seeking a person to fill the position of Principal of Uganda Christian University (UCU) Bishop Barham University College (BBUC). 

“My husband told me to apply for that job, saying it was mine.  I could also see that if I applied for the job, I would surely get it,” Kyobutungi said.

Kyobutungi, indeed, applied for the job. After several rounds of interviews, she was selected to lead the institution, thus becoming the first female principal of UCU-BBUC. A principal’s role is to oversee and manage all aspects of the university college’s operations.

The first thing that Kyobutungi did when she walked into her office after her appointment as principal was to pray to God and ask Him to walk with her on this journey. She even pinned up a prayer on her office wall, which she says every morning. According to Kyobutungi, her time at UCU has improved her spirituality, enabling her to put God at the center of her work.

From day one, when Dr. Kyobutungi joined UCU- BBUC, she was struck by the muddy road from the gate into the university. 

“An institution of higher learning should look better than a secondary school,” she said.

Although she was told that the budget for that year had already been approved, she did not give up on her quest to pave the road. With her team’s consent, Kyobutungi used the money that had been earmarked to procure a vehicle and instead obtained the car on hire purchase. In addition, they set up retainer walls and renovated the institution’s multi-purpose building. Other than the paving of the road, the other developments were achieved using the collections from the UCU Sunday. 

In 2017, the House of Bishops of the Province of the Church of Uganda resolved to designate the last Sunday of September as a UCU Sunday. UCU Sunday was established to mobilize financial resources to support the university’s projects, especially infrastructure and to raise awareness about the institution. This tradition spans across Uganda, with every Anglican Church in Uganda participating.

As the principal, Kyobutungi is committed to ensuring that the academic standards at the institution are upheld, particularly in terms of qualification among the faculty. 

One of her major achievements has been enforcing strict policies in tuition payments. On many occasions, students used to complete their studies without paying their fees, something which generated financial instability. 

She established a policy where students had to pay at least 45% of the tuition fee before sitting tests and allowed leniency for only one semester. She believes that unless the fees are paid on time, the university will never be able to meet its costs promptly.

“I have worked at several universities, but I can say that UCU is special,” she said. “At UCU-BBUC, we groom the students both morally and intellectually.”

Currently, BBUC has books but owns no library structure. It rents library space at the cathedral. But Kyobutungi has plans to resolve that. Five years from now, she hopes that the institution will have its own library. 

Kyobutungi is the ninth of 10 children, although most of her siblings have passed away. Only her family’s fifth-born, a brother, is still alive. Because of this, she grew up as the apple of everyone’s eye.

She is well-known for her passion of reading and writing. The love for reading, she says, was first lit in her Primary Three when she was asked to recite a folk tale before her class. She did not share any because she had none. However, when she returned home, she asked the wife of her brother to narrate folktales to her. 

It’s then that she learned that stories dwelled in books. From that moment, she dived into literature and read everything, from novel series to Bible stories. 

In primary school, she read all the books in their small library. By Primary Seven, she says, her teacher saw her as a candidate with immense potential after she scored 99% in essay writing. 

“If I can write a good essay, then I can write,” she told herself. 

After primary school, she joined Bweranyangi Girls’ Secondary School in western Uganda. Unlike her primary school, Bweranyangi had a large library. Here, they held class reading sessions, where books were brought in a box, and each student would pick one to read. 

At the end of the week, each student would discuss what they read. If a student completed reading the book, they qualified to receive another one. This motivated her to complete her books so she could continue to explore new ones. And that is how her love for literature was awakened.

Kyobutungi has held various positions, spanning from head of the English Department at Mbarara High School and, later, at Rutooma Senior Secondary School. Both schools are located in western Uganda. During her higher education teaching career at Mbarara High School, the students loved her so much that they gifted her a heifer when she graduated with a PhD.

She then graduated to the position of Head of the Languages and Literature Department at Bishop Stuart University and later became the Dean of the Faculty of Education. 

Kyobutungi has over 15 publications, including the poetry collection Dance of the Intellect, Building the Nation: A Romance, Gender and Rural Transformation: A Post-Modernist Perspective, Fireplace Experience in Ankole, Henry Barlow’s Poetry a Romanticist Reading Science and Development: Bridging the Gender Gap in Rural Communities of selected Countries of East Africa, The Hidden Princess, Wondering and Wandering of Hearts, Poems from Uganda among others.

Kyobutungi holds a BA Lit/Lin and Dip Educ. from Makerere University, and a Master of Arts (Lit) Makerere University and a PhD in Language Culture and Society (LCS) (Literature bias) from Bishop Stuart University. 

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