Study reveals lack of awareness about role of appraisal

From left: Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang, Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang'i and TSC chief executive officer Nancy Macharia converse before the announcement of the 2016 KCSE results at Shimo La Tewa High School in Mombasa on December 29, 2016. A section of teachers are not familiar with the importance of being appraised. PHOTO | LABAN WALLOGA | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Classroom teachers are appraised on professional knowledge and its application, time management, innovation and creativity in teaching.

A number of teachers do not understand performance appraisal, despite having been evaluated for the past one year, a study has shown.

The study by a government agency revealed that 11.1 per cent of teachers were not familiar with the performance appraisal system (Pas) for monitoring learner achievement by the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec).

The report, released on Tuesday, said: “88.2 per cent of the teachers who were reported to be familiar with Pas by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) had set their targets for the term.”

All the 298,000 teachers are subjected to a performance appraisal.

TSC uses the results to assign, train, promote and deploy teachers to various administrative positions.

Heads of institutions are assessed on resource management, service delivery and maintenance of teaching standards, integrity and national values while classroom teachers are appraised on professional knowledge and its application, time management, innovation and creativity in teaching.

The study was conducted in December last year in all the 47 counties, with the objective of finding out the personal, home background and school-based characteristics of Standard Three pupils, the personal and professional characteristics of their English, Kiswahili, mathematics and life skills teachers and also the personal and professional characteristics of primary school head teachers.

A total 247 schools, 247 head teachers, 466 teachers and 5,522 pupils were involved in the study.