The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) is in advanced plans to promote P1 teachers to teach in Junior Secondary Schools (JSS).
The Commission is set to promote graduate teachers from primary schools to teach in junior secondary school (JSS) in a bid to address the current shortage of teachers in JSS across the country.
According to the Commission, it is currently collecting applications from qualified teachers before working on where they shall be posted.
This follows the Commission’s recruitment drive that hired 30,550 who have since reported to their respective JSS schools for the first term.
Over the past week, public schools across the country have experienced a shortage of teachers as thousands of learners transitioned from primary school to JSS.
Most of the JSS have not started teaching Grade 7 learners with headteachers worried about the situation.
The TSC Chief Executive Officer (CEO) admitted that there was a shortage of teachers in JSS but said that the government was already addressing the matter,
She said that the Commission was using its portal to receive applications from graduate teachers who currently work in primary schools.
“We shall use the data collected to transfer qualified teachers from primary schools to junior secondary schools once we are done with the mapping,” said Dr Nancy Macharia.
The exercise was done up to the 6th of February 2023 at midnight when it was closed.
Macharia added that recently recruited teachers had reported t JSS and termed the current shortage of teachers as a ‘teething challenge’ as learners transitioned to JSS.
THE TSC CEO was addressing members of the press at SawelaLodge in Naivasha where she met members of the Senate committee on education.
The requirements for application for deployment were as follows.
- At least grade C+ (Plus) mean grade at the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) or its equivalent.
- At least grade C+ (Plus) in the two teaching subjects at Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) or its equivalent.
- At least 8 units in each of the two teaching subjects.
- Must be serving as a primary school teacher under TSC.
On the delocalization policy of teachers, the TSC CEO said that the policy affected 14,000 teachers had been affected adding that TSC had considered the issue of equity during the transfers.
On his part, the Chairperson of the Senate Committee of Education Josepth Nyuthu said that the shortage of teachers in JSS was a worrying issue and called on the State to intervene to solve the issue.
Murang’a Senator said that the issue could worsen next year when the second cohort of students joined JSS where there was already a shortage of teachers.
“The government should move fast and recruit more teachers in JSS as this crisis could worsen come next year when more students join junior secondary schools,” he said.
The Senator also addressed the Salaries and Remuneration Commission’s (SRC) to reduce the salaries of ECDE teachers saying it was abusive to the education sector.
He said that the Senate will push the government to allocate Kes. 2 Bilion for every county every fiscal year to ECDE and Vocational Training Centres.
Nyutu said that the SRC’s proposal did not make any sense adding that this could affect the morale of education stakeholders.
“We reject in totality the proposal by SRC to slash salaries of ECDE teachers as this is an abuse to the education sector,” he said.