Education system set for reforms following recommendations

By LILLIAN ALUANGAEducation system is set for changes that will revolutionise standards, quality, training, monitoring, evaluation, and management.If recommendations by the Taskforce on Realignment of the Education Sector to the Constitution and Vision 2030 are adapted, then the country may see restructuring of a system that has been around for over two decades.Sources privy to the taskforce recommendations say among the proposals is to have a flexible and comprehensive structure of the education system and curriculum reform to specify expected competences at every level.This would see individuals spend two years in pre-primary, six in primary, six in secondary, two in middle level colleges, and three years in university.Education Permanent Secretary James ole Kiyiapi addresses Chavakali Boys’ High School students, yesterday. The PS says reforms in the education sector will give prominence to development of technical skills. [PHOTO: BENJAMIN SAKWA/STANDARD]It is expected the restructuring will ensure 100 per cent transition rate from primary to secondary school by introducing automatic progression to the junior secondary phase based on acquisition of core skills and competencies in literacy, numeracy and communications skills.When reached for comment, Education PS James Kiyiapi declined to speak on specifics of the taskforces’ interim report, but conceded the ministry was looking at a broad justification for reforms in the sector."I cannot comment on that because the final report is not yet ready. Let us wait for the minister to get the final document and make it public," he says.While conceding the current system was not perfect, Kiyiapi says it would be unfair to make a blanket condemnation."Our education system has challenges but it has also worked well in certain respects. Besides Ghana and Zimbabwe, Kenya is among countries on the continent that has the most well developed human resource," says Kiyiapi.The PS enumerated a broader reform agenda that the ministry has been working on, which identifies quality, access, relevance and equity, transition, reforming the education system to align it to the Constitution, response to current and emerging global issues, institutional management, and financing as among key challenges facing the current system.Kiyiapi cites a current teacher shortage of 80,000, weak infrastructure in some areas, access to education, especially among children in remote areas and informal settlements, as having hampered efforts to offer quality education.Since independence the number of public and private primary schools has increased from about 6,000 to over 27,000. The same period has seen secondary schools increase from 150 to over 7,000. Current assessment systems are among issues that featured in the taskforces’ findings, which point to the fact that the current summative assessment at the end of every cycle does not measure learners’ abilities.Canada schoolsAlso highlighted is the current education system’s huge leaning towards examinations, with little attention paid to aspects of moulding pupils into good citizens. The team also noted that examinations have largely been used to sieve those who can move to the next level of education rather than being a part of the teaching and learning process.Former Alliance Boys High School Principal Christopher Khaemba however says the problem is not the 8-4-4 system per se, but a failure by Government to commit and mobilise adequate resources for public schools, which are currently understaffed and over enrolled.Khaemba, who is the immediate former dean of the South Africa-based African Leadership Academy, says the good performance by Kenyan students at the school compared to others from around the world showed that children from well furnished schools are competitive at international levels."I have been to Canada’s schools where the 8-4-4 system was borrowed from. The system is working well for them but the difference is that their public schools are sufficiently staffed, and have a well defined mechanism of evaluating delivery of the curriculum," he says.Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) Secretary General Akelo Misori says more emphasis should be put on improving content in the curriculum."We have for a long time acted impulsively on challenges facing the education sector, and ceded control of the sector to politicians. Now is the time for us to be clear on what kind of education system we want," he says.Kenya’s history of formal education dates back to the arrival of missionaries, who were among the earliest founders of educational institutions. Before independence, the country’s education system was drawn along racial lines but this changed following recommendations made by the Ominde Commission, in 1964. Subsequent years saw the setting up of several commissions and committees on education resulting in the Gachathi Report (1976), Mckay Report (1981), Kamunge Report (1988) and Koech Report (1999).Although each report gave recommendations on the education system, none has perhaps been as controversial as the McKay Report, which birthed the 8-4-4 system.Essentially, 8-4-4 was fashioned on the premise that its predecessor, the 7-4-2-3 system (used between 1964 and 1985) was churning out an elitist population that lacked vocational skills, crucial for self-employment.Critics of the system, however, argue 8-4-4 failed to achieve some of its key objectives since the large numbers of school drop-outs has not automatically translated to an increase in the numbers of those who are self employed or absorbed into informal employment. Kiyiapi, however, says upcoming reforms in the education sector will give more prominence to development of technical skills. Also taken into account is reviewing the education system to allow it respond to current and emerging issues and produce a competitive human resource. "Other challenges in the sector relate to how we can better co ordinate educational programmes, improve institutional management, and ensure all educational programmes are properly financed," he says.With transition rates from primary to secondary levels currently at 73 per cent, the Constitution’s provisions which demand that every child gets at least 14 years of basic education on the Government’s expense, is yet to realised.

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