Confusion in education spells ominous future

Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha leads ministry officials in launching the National Curriculum Policy at the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development on May 15, 2019. PHOTO | KANYIRI WAHITO | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Education is too important to be treated casually; it is, therefore, prudent to consult widely and deeply before a model is rolled out.

  • The new Education Cabinet secretary, Prof George Magoha, is quite energetic and can lead meaningful reforms in the sector.

  • He, however, must climb down, listen to diverse opinions, aim for consensus during policy formulation and be firm on implementation.

Prof Lukoye Atwoli recently lamented that university education had been hijacked by pseudo-academics, who occupy top management positions and the Commission for University Education (CUE).

In his weekly column (Sunday Nation, July 16), he was outraged that these “fakes” have diverted the focus of the universities from intellectual discourse, evidence-driven research, innovation and critical thinking to accumulation of papers to measure performance and justify better ranking.

ACADEMIC FALSEHOOD

This preoccupation with assessment and justification of performance at the expense of actual performance is what David Graeber gives as an example of “bullshit jobs” in his book by the same title.

Professors now sit for hours in small rooms struggling to put together all sorts of materials to improve their ranking for a short-term commercial advantage at the expense of actual academic output. But good research work, innovation and publications easily find their way onto the web and hardly require desktop lobbying.

But it is not just in this academic falsehood that our education is jaundiced! The battle pitting the Ministry of Education against the Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) with regard to implementation of the competency-based curriculum is another that spells an ominous future for our children. Education is too important to be treated casually; it is, therefore, prudent to consult widely and deeply before a model is rolled out.

There should be no emergency in curriculum reform as we already have millions of students who have gone through the 8-4-4 curriculum and are the drivers of our socioeconomic development agenda. The country can take its time to pilot with a small number of students as the experts study and rectify the flaws, even as the citizens dialogue and build consensus.

A whole generation of children are not like roads or buildings that, if skewed in construction, can be brought down and be built afresh.

LOWER QUALITY

In yet another area of concern, the Teachers Service Commission has rejected admission to teacher training colleges of students who scored D+ while another state agency supports their enrolment. According to the teachers’ employer, students who fall below grade C in KCSE will lower the quality of education in primary schools.

That may be the case, but in a country boasting so many education experts, one would have expected well-researched evidence in support of the notion that D+ students are less teachable and not simply hang onto anecdotal street beliefs. And what informs the C cut-off?

Last is the ill-informed ad hoc CUE requirement that lecturers in Kenyan universities have a PhD by 2018 when some professional courses lack even master’s degree holders to hire.

The new Education Cabinet secretary, Prof George Magoha, is quite energetic and can lead meaningful reforms in the sector. He, however, must climb down, listen to diverse opinions, aim for consensus during policy formulation and be firm on implementation.

A high-speed train is wonderful when on track but can be disastrous if it derails. Let Prof Magoha maintain the speed but keep to the railway.

Dr Odhiambo is a senior lecturer at the University of Nairobi’s College of Health Sciences. [email protected]