TSC Receives Ksh14 Billion to Hire, Train Teachers on New Curriculum

The Teachers Service Commission has received 14 billion shillings from the National Treasury that will help in hiring and training teachers on the new curriculum.

According to the treasury, the additional funds to the teacher’s employer supplements the 2018/2019 budget allocation that was initially at 226 billion shillings.

The TSC had been pushing for additional funds to help in the hiring of new teachers and training them on the new curriculum since most teachers were getting overwhelmed with the duty of having to attend to a large number of pupils.

The adverse shortage of teachers is mostly seen at the secondary and primary school levels where it was estimated at 96,345 by the end of June last year.

For the new curriculum to be successful, training had to be initiated and the process was estimated to cost about 500 million shillings.

Most schools in the country have been facing a shortage of teachers since there has been a rapid increase in the enrolment of pupils disfavoring the teacher-pupil ratio.

READ ALSO: Kenya Has an Acute Shortage of Teachers – TSC Report Shows

Nancy Macharia, TSC chief executive officer said that the commission is planning to recruit at least 100,000 interns using 82 billion shillings for a period of four years (2020-2023).

“These initiatives include the Government’s policy of 100 per cent transition from primary to secondary. By 2023, the teacher shortage is projected to hit 61,671 for secondary school and 34,941 for primary,” said Ms Macharia.

The new competency-based curriculum (CBC) training was held in April and a total of 91,320 teachers underwent the four-day program in Nairobi.

The CBC program requires master trainers of which 172 officers, drawn from different institutions including the education directorates, TSC, Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development, Kenya Institute of Special Education and Kenya National Education Commission were trained last week.

The TSC boss made these remarks while speaking during the launch of the commission’s 2019/2023 strategic plan in Nairobi.