Teachers call for broad reforms in education

By Augustine Oduor

Secondary school head teachers have cautioned against reducing the education reforms debate to whether the current system should be scraped or not.

The teachers say there are fundamental issues that ought to be addressed and not mere talk on the structure of an education system.

In a terse message to education stakeholders, the principals also warned against playing politics with the reforms in the education sector.

The Kenya Secondary School Heads Association (Kessha) national chairman Cleopas Tirop said the first thing education stakeholders should focus on is curriculum review.

"The curriculum must be reviewed to conform with the current challenges and vision 2030. Let us look at the current inadequacies to inform the debate on the reforms," he said.

In a statement to The Standard, Mr Tirop said the gaps weighing down the current system are not structure issues.

Adequate resources

If we address issues of teachers, adequate resources, adoption of Information and Communication Technology, review the curriculum, availing more books, the rest will fall in place," he said.

He added: "Once we have fixed these issues, they will automatically enforce the current structure or nullify it. There is no quick fix by rushing to change the system."

The head teachers spoke as the debate on the report by the Douglas Odhiambo-led team continued to draw sharp reactions from education stakeholders.

Higher Education minister Margaret Kamar warned against scrapping the current 8-4-4 system, saying doing so would affect development.

Prof Kamar said the cost of implementing the proposed new education system would be too high for the country.

She said it would be unwise for the Government to spend Sh310 billion to implement a system that was of "no significant value" to the country while there were many uncompleted projects that need funds.

But speaking yesterday, Prof Odhiambo, who chaired the education review taskforce, said the issue of cost should not arise.

He said: "Even the current system is not cheap. What we did was to align the education system to the new Constitution and what we proposed is in the best interest of the country.

He added: "The education content is more important. Whether it is 8-4-4 or not the rest are the carriers of a system."

Former President Moi’s regime replaced the previous 7-4-2-3 system of education with eight years of primary, four years of secondary, and four years of university education.

The proposed academic programme will see pupils spend two years in Early Childhood Development Education, six years in primary, another six years in secondary, and minimum of three years at the university.

New proposal

Secondary education will be divided into junior and senior levels in the new proposal.

But the views on the education reforms in the country have been so varied that no common ground was adopted in the just concluded three-day conference to discuss the same.

Kenya National Union of Teachers and Kenya Union of Post-Primary Education Teachers have also opposed scrapping of the current system.

They argued that amendments should be effected in the current system to make it more relevant and responsive to current challenges and Vision 2030.