The Mountain Journal
By James Wakahiu
Four Kenyan universities are now free to admit teachers for a compulsory re-training course after the High Court sitting in Nairobi declined to stop the scheme. Justice David Nderitu of the Employment and Labour Court declined to stop the roll-out of the programme following a petition by Mr Joseph Karanja, an education consultant.
The refresher course dubbed Teacher Professional Development (TPD) administered by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) will be modular and is aimed at boosting tutors’ skills and guiding their promotion. The judge ruled that due to the weight of the orders sought and its effects, Mr Karanja ought to serve TSC and other respondents in the case, for a hearing by all parties.
This means the TSC can now begin rolling out the new TPD which will see tutors in both primary and secondary schools undergo professional, in-service training in institutions of higher learning before their teaching licenses are renewed every five years.
The continuous training and education course will run for 30 years and has six modules each lasting every five years. Kenyatta University, Mount Kenya University (MKU), Riara and Kenya Education Management Institute will be responsible for the training as accredited service providers.
Regulation 48 of the TSC code of Regulations 2015 says every teacher is required to undertake the TPD programme, which will determine their promotion, among others.
Karanja had sought orders to halt TSC from rolling out the programme, insisting that lack of public participation as provided under Article 232 of the Constitution. He said the teachers and other stakeholders in the sector were not engaged in the development of the content of the modules.
According to TSC, the four institutions have been contracted on an annual agreement, with an option for extension. The role of these service providers is to facilitate the training of teachers TPD programme based on the prescribed modules; carry out assessment on teachers; issue completion certificates; and maintain data related to the TPD project.
The TPD programme is designed to cover the following professionals: 222,000 primary school teachers, 90,000 secondary school teachers, 22,224 instructional leaders in primary schools and 8000 instructional leaders in secondary schools
Launching the programme recently, TSC chief executive Nancy Macharia said the plan is to professionalise the teaching fraternity to match other careers such as Law, Accounting and Engineering. Each of the 340,000 tutors across the country will each be required to pay Sh6, 000 for each module.
MKU Vice Chancellor, Prof Deogratius Jaganyi, praised theTSC for the professional engagement with stakeholders in the process of advertisement of the bid to offer TPD to the Service Providers, the entire smooth evaluation process and now the implementation stage. “The competitive nature of the process that was followed requires commendation for the integrity-driven process that was adopted,” he said.
Prof Jaganyi said MKU has an adequate infrastructural network, modern reliable technology and human resource capacity for the successful implementation of TPD. “We have spread our network within the country in a formidable physical presence through campuses, Open, Distance, and Electronic Learning (ODEL) centres, marketing centres and strategic partnerships with key stakeholders. All these will contribute directly towards the effective implementation of the TPD in all the 290 sub-counties in Kenya,” he said.
Quoting Nobel Prize Laureate Rabindranath Tagore, the VC said a teacher can never truly teach unless he is still learning himself. “A lamp can never light another lamp unless it continues to burn its own flame,” Tagore said in 1994.
Prof Jaganyi said the training will provide opportunities for teachers to explore new roles, develop new instructional and leadership techniques, refine their practice and broaden their outlook as educators and as individuals. “This will improve the learning outcomes and definitely the beneficiary is the Kenyan Child,” he said.
“Besides, when we have quality teachers at schools, the roll-out of CBC will be more efficiently done and also the impact of education to the overall public good will be more effectively witnessed. Professional teachers will improve learning outcomes in Kenyan schools and ultimately lead to the achievement of SDGs 2030, Kenya Vision 2030, and the African Union’s Agenda 2063,” he added.
You can get in touch with our Newdesk through
