As he watched his younger sister walk seven miles to a school in a neighboring village and then make the same seven-mile trek home each night, Rev. Charles Niwagaba '09 MEA told himself he would someday build a secondary school in his native village of Rubirizi, Uganda.
The St. Thomas Vocational School is the culmination of that mission, but it didn't happen until after Fr. Niwagaba traveled some 8,000 miles to St. Ambrose to gain the administrative skills he needed to complete the task.
Fr. Niwagaba said more than 500 Rubirizi children are getting the equivalent of U.S. high school education today thanks in large part to his St. Ambrose postgraduate education, as well as the encouragement and generosity of parishioners at St. Mary's Catholic Church in East Moline, Ill., where he served as pastor while pursuing his master's.
"So many things have been coming my way, I think God needed me to do something in my village," he said during a recent return visit the Midwest.
Fr. Niwagaba had begun making plans to build the school as early as 2004, when he met with an architect to design the structure while teaching at a seminary 250 miles away. He learned the cost would be prohibitive.
In 2005, Fr. Niwagabe traveled to the United States to pursue a Master of Theology degree at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh. He enrolled in the St. Ambrose Master of Education Administration program following his graduation from Duquesne in 2007.
His dream to open a school that could better the lives of village children whose families survive on subsistence wages got a boost through fundraising programs launched by parishioners at St. Mary's.
The St. Thomas Vocational Secondary School opened in 2010 and its first graduates are now enrolling in a growing number of universities in Uganda
Had Fr. Niwagaba not founded the school, a few of Rubirizi's 500 students might have gone to secondary schools in villages miles away, but only those with the means to go to boarding school or, like his sister, the determination to walk dozens of miles each day.
Uganda has been making significant progress in reducing poverty levels, which once totaled 56 percent of the population. But nearly 25 percent of all Ugandans still lived in poverty when Fr. Niwagaba earned his master's at St. Ambrose and, as recently as 2012, Uganda ranked 161st out of 187 nations on the United Nations Human Development Index.
The St. Thomas school is striving to improve those conditions.
"We encourage students to study engineering and other courses that provide skills that are marketable because we are a vocational school," Fr. Niwagaba said. "But we are also giving them skills so they can be job creators."
The school is a source of jobs in Rubirizi, a community of 20,000 or so in the country's southeast sector. More than 60 people are employed as educators and administrators and Fr. Niwagaba and his supporters have hopes to expand.
The administrative skills he learned through the St. Ambrose MEA program have been invaluable, Fr. Niwagaba said. So has the practical experience he gained through internships and observation placements in Quad Cities-area schools.
"I am trying to take what I learned and observed to make sure schools in Uganda measure up to schools here," he said, proudly noting, "My school is the only one in Uganda that teaches computer skills. Other schools don't emphasize that but of course here I saw how much technology is used in education."
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