Increment of fees: Principals to push for review of Mwiria report

Members of the Kenya Secondary Schools Heads Association (KESSHA) during their last year’s meeting in Mombasa. [File, Standard]

The 44th Kenya Secondary Schools Heads Association (KESSHA) is set to kick off in Mombasa next week where principals are expected to push for the review of the 2014 education report by a task force.

Yesterday, KESSHA chairman Kahi Indimuli said the Kilemi Mwiria report should be reviewed because changes have taken place since it was compiled five years ago.

One of the areas the principals are expected to push for is the upward review of school fees paid by parents and state capitation for students.

“There has been a lot of changes in the economy and expansion of schools. We must re-look at the report, especially on capitation and the fees parents pay,” said Indimuli.

Speaking to the Saturday Standard, Indimuli said the head teachers will also make their stand known on the implementation of the Competence-Based Curriculum (CBC) rolled out this year.

“We must now agree that we cannot afford to crowd the implementation of the CBC with noise. We must come up with solutions by talking to each and not at each other,” he said.

The KESSHA chair said the principals will deliberate on how they will effectively start the process and anchor the CBC in junior secondary school.

“The CBC is already designed and so we need to deliberate where we are anchoring junior secondary. We will have to look at the process,” said Indimuli.

The principals will look at the nagging issue of shortage of teachers, which has been worsened by the government’s push for 100 per cent primary to secondary school transition.

“We will make bare the colossal amount of money the schools are using to recruit the BoG teachers. This is not the core mandate of schools. Schools cannot be employers, our work is to impart knowledge to students,” said Indimuli.

He said the BoG teachers were gobbling up a lot of money, hence straining the provision of effective learning and teaching materials.

Other issues the teachers are expected to discuss, according to Indimuli, are rising cases of suicide in schools and security of the learners.

The over 8,000 secondary school headteachers will converge on Monday at the Kenya School of Revenue Administration (KESRA) in Mombasa.