President William Ruto has urged parents to take centre stage in the education of their children.
Ruto said Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) has given parents a chance to be part of the education of their children.
“The education of our children is not only the responsibility of teachers but ours as well.
“As a parent, myself included, I have pressure from my own daughter every evening asking me to assist her with assignments. It’s not too much to ask,” Ruto said when he presided over the swearing-in of 51 Principal Secretaries (PSs) at State House on Friday, December 2.
He added: “I know in the past, parents use to have little to do with the education of their children but CBC has recruited them to the middle of the education of their children and I think it is a positive progress.”
Ruto on Thursday, December 1 received an interim report from Presidential Working Party on Education Reform that he formed in September to review the education sector.
While adopting the report, the government declared that the Grade 6 Kenya Primary School Education Assessment (KPSEA) will not be used for placement in junior secondary schools.
State House Spokesperson Hussein Mohamed on November 30, 2022, said in a statement that the assessment will instead be used to monitor learning progress and provide feedback to education sector players on areas that require intervention.
Similarly, he said that the Junior Secondary School (JSS) comprising Grade 7, Grade 8 and Grade 9, will be domiciled in the existing primary schools.
“The Ministry of Education will provide the necessary guidelines on how this will be done,” Hussein said.
These recommendations are contained in the presidential working party on education, which presented its interim report to President William Ruto yesterday at State House.
It has also been agreed that extra classrooms and laboratories will be built in every primary school, with laboratories being given priority within the next year.
“Members of Parliament are asked to work towards providing support for the extra facilities. Meanwhile, primary schools neighbouring secondary schools will share the laboratories and other facilities with junior secondary schools,” he stated.
The Ministry of Education, Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) and the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) are also expected to work on modalities of fast-tracking retooling teachers to ensure the country has sufficient numbers who are compliant with CBC.
Priority will be given to those teachers who will be handling Grade 7 learners.
During their public participation fora across counties, a majority of Kenyans recommended that JSS be domiciled in primary schools saying that the learners are too young to join secondary schools.
