Better paid teachers means a better Kenya, no doubt!

By Angela Ambitho

NAIROBI, KENYA: April 2013; Teachers in South Africa abandon classrooms demanding better wages and working conditions whilst lecturers in Northern India activate mass boycott until their pay demands are met. May 2013; Ghanaian teachers plan countrywide sit-down over unpaid allowances whilst 72 per cent of Spanish teachers participate in national strike over education budget cuts. June 2013; Nigeria Union of Teachers urges  members to strike due to non-payment of priorly negotiated pay increase whilst thousands of teachers in Liverpool, Manchester and the north-west of England  hold  strike over pay, pension and  work conditions.

These are just but select examples illustrating that teachers are disgruntled almost everywhere. Whereas some may be quick to argue that it’s the magnitude of teacher numbers within public workforce that often undermines their collective demands for better pay, others contend that misplaced priorities in national budgetary allocations precipitates the strained relationship between academia and the state. Our local situation attests to this. There is irony in refusing to yield to teachers’ remuneration demands on one hand while surrendering to the publicly disapproved hefty MP pay demands on the other.

Kenyans appreciate that whilst we need good politicians, we need even better teachers. And conventional wisdom suggests that the caliber of citizens a country possesses can be directly attributed to the quality of the education system. Indeed, various researches have proven that globally competitive countries are those who pay their teachers well and where teaching attracts the best brains.

In Finland for instance, teachers are selected from the top quartile of academic performers with primary school teaching representing the most sought after profession. If Kenya is to attain global competitive advantages, we must embrace policies that restore teaching as a revered profession.

The laptop a child plan by the Jubilee Government seems to be a noble long term strategy seeking to make Kenyans globally competitive. Yet one should ask whether computer literacy supersedes numeracy.  The US is today reviewing its education system to ensure that students become comparatively enumerate and able to compete with China, India and S.E Asia where high numeracy has contributed to innovation, productivity and competitiveness. Kenyan children need not only be good in speech, reading and writing but also in math and science. The computer can then be used as the conduit that galvanises the medulla content.  

In a nutshell, we must get our priorities right. We seem to have put the cart before the horse with the laptop project. Our first priority should be in developing a competitive curriculum that sets us ahead of the global pack. Like America, we must ensure that our brains are fed with the right content. Like Finland, our second priority should be in attracting and retaining good teaching staff who feel well motivated to teach our kids. Our third priority can then evolve around the structures and facilities that support modern learning. This is where the computer comes in.

Winston Churchill once quipped that the “empires of the future will be the empires of the mind”. Undoubtedly, this seems to be what the current government wants to achieve with laptops. Yet, these new empires can only be attained though the nurturing of young minds by inspirational teachers. Better paid teachers will result in a better Kenya. No doubt