Ministry on course to roll out CBC for Grade 4 next month

Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha Wednesday outlined several critical issues that he said will be implemented next year, with emphasis on the implementation of the new curriculum, which will enter Grade Four.

CAPACITY

Speaking during the release of this year’s Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) exam results in Nairobi, Prof Magoha said the ministry is fully prepared to roll out the CBC in Grade Four from January.

He noted that the ministry had supplied Grade Four textbooks in 97 per cent of the counties.

“The remaining counties will be reached before schools open for the first term in January. Indeed, these are the regions where the ministry encountered difficulties to deliver books due to the ongoing rains,” said the CS.

For sustainable capacity development of teachers under the CBC, and to improve the quality of education, Prof Magoha said the government had revised the lowest pre-service teacher training qualification from certificate (P1) to diploma level.

“A curriculum for this new level of training has been completed and the new cohort of learners will be admitted to various colleges in 2020. I expect relevant departments to release details of the application and training process in due course,” he added.

GAZETTEMENT

The CS announced that the task force he set up to advise him on curriculum reforms was finalising regulations and guidelines on establishment of institutions under the Basic Education Framework.

The proposed regulations and guidelines, Prof Magoha said, will be subjected to public participation before gazettement.

“Part of the proposals that we will expect Kenyans to dialogue on is a recommendation that the ministry should establish transition committees at the national, county and sub-county levels. Terms of reference for the committees will include putting in place strategies to ensure 100 per cent transition of learners from primary to junior secondary school in 2023,” he said.

At the August National Curriculum Reforms Conference, President Kenyatta announced that there will be no national exam in Grade Six.

TSC chief executive Nancy Macharia said the commission will post 10,000 teachers by January to ease the shortage in schools. She said TSC had started training of 106,320 teachers for the CBC Grade Four rollout in January, which includes 7 000 SNE teachers and 18 000 teachers from private schools.

INVENTORY

The CS assured Kenyans that the CBC will be anchored on evidence-based decisions.

“As a result, the task force on Curriculum Reforms is recommending to set up a watertight monitoring and evaluation system in 2020 that will include baseline data indicators that will be relied on from time to time to make solid decisions on prudent utilisation of resources across the sector,” he said.

On 100 per cent transition policy, Prof Magoha said from January, the government will embark on a campaign to ensure that all candidates who sat KCPE this year join in Form One.

“I have asked all primary school head teachers – through the TSC and Kenya Primary School Heads Association – to develop an inventory of the schools to which their 2019 candidates were placed and liaise with all relevant agencies and institutions to ensure they are enrolled in Form One,” said the CS.

SCHOLARSHIPS

Prof Magoha announced that applications for the 9,000 Ministry of Education scholarships – through the support of the World Bank-funded Secondary Education Quality Improvement Project (SEQIP) – closed on Monday.

“I am optimistic that needy candidates from the 110 sub-counties and 15 urban areas with informal settlements will be awarded the scholarships and be enabled to join Form One in 2020. A further 9,000 will benefit from the same scholarships in 2021, bringing the total number of beneficiaries to 18,000 at a cost of Sh3 billion,” said the CS.

He said the government will build more classrooms in public secondary schools at Sh8billion.

On the National Education Management Information System (NEMIS) platform, he said the government will ensure that the details of all candidates are captured.

He said already, a total of 9,112 public secondary schools and a further 3,915 private schools have been captured under the NEMIS system.

REPLACEMENTS

“We have a commendable 3 million learners from public secondary schools enrolled in the NEMIS data while 112,032 have been enlisted from private secondary schools.

 At the primary school level, 23,705 public primary schools have been enlisted in the NEMIS data. We have enrolled a combined 6.5 million primary school learners,” he said.

TSC Chief executive officer Nancy Macharia said the Commission will post 10,000 teachers by January to schools to ease the shortage existing in schools.

“This will go hand in hand with the routine teacher replacements for those leaving due to natural attrition,” said Mrs Macharia.

Schools by January will be facing a shortage of 125,000 teachers.

TRAINING

On CBC, she said the Commission has started a massive training exercise for 106 320 teachers in preparation for the CBC Grade 4 Rollout in January, which includes 7 000 SNE teachers and 18 000 teachers from private schools.

“I wish to assure the country that by the end of the exercise, the country will have 228,000 teachers trained on CBC. This means we have a critical mass of staff who will deliver the curriculum,” said Mrs Macharia.