Page 406 - Contributed Paper Session (CPS) - Volume 6

CPS2000 Agnes M. N. Ssekiboobo
3.2. The journey
SSP brought on board these concerns and other issues raised and
repositioned itself to play a greater role in current statistical reforms and
development in Africa by undertaking the following initiatives:
a. Realigning its training programmes, research agenda and consultancy
work with the new national and international focus on managing for
results where demand is for development statistics and not traditional
statistics. As an organization, SSP has carried out a number of
consultancies and research activities independently or in collaboration
with other organizations. The research undertaken is in line with the
University-wide research agenda which is linked to the national
development framework, principally the National Development Plan
(NDP) and international development agenda; formerly the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) and now the Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs). A number of members of staff also do consultancies for
governments, national or international organizations, as individuals or in
collaboration with other schools or consultants. This has helped deepen
the professional credentials of SSP and its staff. In line with the University-
wide research agenda, SSP staff have been encouraged to spend more
time doing research and publishing; sourcing funds for research and, in
general, promoting research work and building partnerships for research
between SSP and collaborators; closing research capacity gaps by
expanding disciplines on which research is done; and SSP putting the
Centre for Population and Applied Statistics (CPAS) in place fully fledged
to undertake research.
b. Periodically reviewing and updating the curriculum to make the
programmes offered at SSP more relevant to the information needs under
different arrangements, decentralization being one of them. This
enhances the relevance of the curriculum in a dynamic policy and
development environment. It also helps the School to keep pace with
changing user demand for data. More emphasis was also put on
integrative and consistency frameworks or data quality frameworks.
c. Teaching statistics from the demand side rather than the supply side -
realigning training programmes to meeting the needs of data users who
are becoming more diversified and more critical and addressing emerging
needs.
d. Improving training in statistical analysis, reporting, presentation and
communication.
e. Conducting short training courses on policy and decision-making using
statistics.
f. Harnessing IT to improve statistical training and to transform statistical
operations.

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