Learning in Public Schools Hurt as Supply of Textbooks Delay

The initial government plan to supply every primary school pupil with a textbook has flopped due to lack of funds.

Prof. George Magoha, the Cabinet Secretary for Education said that for now, the only solution they have if to have three pupils share one textbook.

Speaking to the National Assembly Committee on Education, professor Magoha told the committee that the government has no money to supply textbooks as it had earlier promised.

He added that of the 2.6 million pupils in grades five and six, the government has plans of supplying textbooks which will be used on a 1:3 textbook to pupil ratio when schools open in January.

“Only 700 million shillings was released to cater for the purchase of textbooks for pupils in grades four, five and six, but that is not enough for each pupil and for the six subjects, given the huge number of pupils in these grades,” he said.

Distribution of textbooks had already started last year as the government was keen on improving the quality of learning.

However, by April this year, learners in grade four, five and six were yet to receive textbooks as the government failed to release cash allocated for books.

The huge number of students and lack of books has therefore caused a nightmare to the public primary school teachers, as they have to share less than ten textbooks in a class of close to a hundred pupils.

The delay has caused Primary school headteachers to call on the government to go back to the old policy where each school received cash meant for textbooks, seeing that the schools will close after a week with no signs of getting the textbooks.

It is no guarantee that the government will heed to the headteachers calls as the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission in the year 2016, discovered there was a fraud in the distribution of books to schools, in which some public schools headteachers engaged.