TSC to Deploy P1 Teachers to Junior Secondary School
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) has agreed to deploy primary school teachers to teach in secondary schools with the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) set to make its debut at the Junior secondary schools level next year.
The Commission is also set to engage teachers’ unions regarding the P1 teachers’ deployment in junior secondary school.
However, the Commission has warned that teachers will have to meet the requirements for deployment to secondary schools.
The Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) is pushing for primary school teachers with a degree in secondary option but with grade C (Plain) in the KCSE examination to teach in junior secondary.
Most primary school teachers have revealed that they are able to teach in junior secondary if they can be given some training on the CBC.
Requirements for teachers to be deployed to teach in Junior Secondary school:
- Be a Kenyan citizen.
- Be a holder of a P1 certificate
- Be a holder of a Bachelor’s Degree in Education with two teaching subjects
- Must have attained at least a C+ (Plus) mean grade at Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) or it’s equivalent and C+ (Plus) or it’s equivalent in the two teaching subjects;
- Must be serving under the Teachers Service Commission
The Commission has also offered to train teachers who will be deployed to teach in junior secondary schools.
Junior Secondary school involves Grades 7, 8 and 9 with the current Grade 6 learners set to join Junior secondary school in January 2023.
KNUT is also having discussions regarding the parliamentary recommendations which ordered the promotion of teachers who upgraded their certificates.
Parliament also recommended that TSC continues recognizing and acknowledging higher qualifications acquired by teachers while in service.
MPs want the Commission to promote teachers who have upgraded their certificates and acquired diplomas, bachelor’s, masters and doctorate degree while in service.
“TSC should within six months of the adoption of this report open negotiations with teachers’ unions on the Career Progression Guidelines (CPGs) and uphold the rights of teachers who have acquired relevant qualifications at the time of their in-service.
“Further TSC shall give guidelines on relevant courses to be undertaken by teachers,” read the Education and Research Committee.
However, on her part the TSC Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Dr Nancy Macharia revealed in parliament that the Commission stopped the automatic promotion of teachers in 2014 because it was not feasible.
According to Macharia the increase in the number of teachers attaining higher qualifications made the policy to promote teachers automatically not feasible leading to the Commission stopping automatic promotions on the 9th of January 2014.
“The higher number of teachers attaining higher qualifications made the policy fiscally unsustainable,” said TSC CEO Dr Nancy Macharia.
According to data provided by the Commission, as of 2020, there were 218,077 teachers in public primary schools. Out of this number, 21,632 teachers (9,821 male and 11,811 female) had Diploma qualifications while 17,930 teachers (8,627 male and 9,303 female) had Bachelor’s Degrees.
Around 491 teachers had Master’s and Doctoral degrees (197 male and 294 female) while the rest had certificates.
Post-primary institutions had 113,155 teachers with 1,725 teachers (909 male teachers and 816 female teachers) having Masters and Doctoral degrees (PhD).
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