In 2004, the late professor George Saitoti, the then minister for education, science and technology made a presentation before the US Council on Foreign Relations, where he stated that the challenges facing primary education in Kenya were low access, low retention and completion rates, and poor facilities in learning institutions.
Uwezo Kenya, an initiative that aims to improve competencies in literacy and numeracy in three East African countries, in its latest report has interesting statistics on education in the region:
Across East Africa, only 1 in 6 pupils in Standard 3 passed a Standard 2 English test.
Across East Africa, children from poorer households perform worse on tests at all ages.
Two in every 10 children in Standard 7 in East Africa do not have Standard 2 level literacy and numeracy competencies.
District level results show there is substantial geographic variation in literacy and numeracy skills within each country.
From the above deductions by Uwezo, it seems that the challenges facing the education sector that were identified in the early 2000s are yet to be dealt with decisively in Kenya.
The new government has pledged a number of changes in the sector, among them the provision of laptops for children joining class one from next year, and free milk for every child going to primary schools. My assumption is that these new ideas are meant to bridge the gaps that have been identified by stakeholders in the sector.
These are noble ideas but they are eliciting questions which the government is yet to respond to adequately.
In this article, I will not get into the issue of the cost of implementing these pledges. Rather, I will look at other aspects of the learning which are crucial in delivering quality education.
Community Education Services Canada, a non-governmental organization that supports access to rural education in Western Kenya says that the need for information, communication and technology in Kenyans schools pales when it is compared to the need for clean water, health care and basic education.
The organization says that since the introduction of the free primary and secondary school, an estimated additional 2 million children are now attending school. The school system has not been able to keep up with the need for new teachers, added school infrastructure and learning resources. The organisation says one solution is to build more primary and secondary schools so the children in rural areas have access to education.
On the other hand, Dr. John Mugo, Country Director for Uwezo Kenya says that the problem with the Kenyan education system is its focus on memorizing facts, rather than creating knowledge and encouraging innovation.
He says that at every level of our education system, up to university level, our exams test knowledge of facts, rather than the ability to argue with existing knowledge, and the creation of new knowledge that Kenya can export to the rest of the world.
“To me, what our children are learning today is the biggest threat to Vision 2030. Not funding, not political will!” says Dr. Mugo.
Before resigning to run for president, former education permanent secretary Prof. James Ole Kiyiapi once stated, “Education is the greatest social equaliser. If we leave it to the private sector, we will create a social apartheid, where only the rich can access it — and it is already happening. Our education system is fundamentally flawed. We are condemning our children too early in life. The reason why KCPE is so brutal is that we don’t have enough spaces in secondary school.”
Will the provision of laptops help to deal with the current problem of an overloaded curriculum, which relies on outdated teaching methods that foster rote and mechanistic learning, rather than encouraging creativity and innovation? Will it help create more learning space in our schools?
In Kenya’s Vision 2030, the government’s plan was to recruit 28,000 more teachers by 2012 in order to achieve required national standards of 1:40 teacher to student ration. Estimates show that there is a shortage of close to 80,000 teachers in our public schools.
Recently, the Kenya National Union of Teachers announced that it will oppose plans by the government to freeze the employment of new staff in the public sector in a bid to control the wage bill. Its national chairman Wilson Sossion reportedly said that the union wanted more teachers to be employed and had submitted recommendations to the Treasury to have Sh15 billion in the next budget set aside for the recruitment of 40,000 new teachers.
Will the provision of laptops help to bridge this gap?
A few years back, Nicholas Burnett, UNESCO’s Assistant Director-General for Education, lamented that higher pupil-teacher ratios, heavier workloads for teachers, freezes on their recruitment and lack of training could aggravate the quality deficit that already exists.
“We cannot build the economic recovery without investing in education, and especially not without investing in teachers, the most important influence on student achievement,” he said.
A report by the Association of Professional Teachers of Kenya last year said that teachers are poorly trained in basic computer programmes that are vital in the execution of their duties. It is not clear as yet whether the government will also invest in training teachers on use of computers.
The Jubilee government promises are coming at a time when teachers are still haggling with the government over pay issues. The teacher’s union chairman recently stated that they expect the government to set aside Sh41 billion in the next budget as earlier agreed, to clear teachers’ medical, commuter and housing allowances.
“Kenyan teachers cannot deliver good services when somebody is trampling on their rights,” he said.
Which raises the question; can the government ignore the teachers who are supposed to supervise the children who will be provided with laptops, without compromising the quality of education?
As Dr. Mugo says, will the laptop be a toy, or a learning tool, or both, and will it be for school or home use?
The government cannot run away from these and many other questions that parents and other stakeholders are asking.
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