Kenyan Government Proposes Free Nursery Education

The joy of seeing your child enroll for their first years of school in Kindergarten will be diluted as soon as you visit that dream KinderCare in your neighborhood and get handed ambiguous figures of what will be the fee structure.

Majority of parents who rush to enroll their children to nursery before the recommended age for reasons such as milestones delay or difficulty in finding a suitable nanny change their minds once handed the fee structure.

Nursery education in Kenya is growing to be one of the most expensive even compared to secondary and university education fee in Kenya.

A nursery school located in estates such as Donholm. Pangani, Juja, Ruiru, Upperhill and the likes will have a parent spending as much as 80,000 shillings and a minimum average of 20,000 shillings.

In city council schools where one would expect very affordable rates if not free, parents and guardians still have to part with significant amounts to see their four or five-year-olds get the overrated good foundation on the start of their academic journey.

Apart from the hefty school fees nursery parents have to contend with, they’re expected to submit to occasional demands of monies to buy ingredients for study or exaggerated amounts to cater for trips that add no value.

The County Early Childhood Education Bill 2018

The County Early Childhood Education Bill 2018 is before Parliament and could act as a savior to parents and guardians of nursery school children who are under the age of six years.

The proposed County Early Childhood Development Education Bill of 2018 seeks to scrap off school for children between the age of three and five years in public nursery schools to ensure access for education to all children.

Parents who keep their children away from school because they cannot afford the fee will now have no reason to do so as the gap between birth and Grade one will now be filled with the availability of free education for nursery children.

The proposed bill is before the education committee in Parliament waiting to be tabled before the Senate and will include the law by which all nursery schools are to be governed by.

The lack of a law to govern the nursery schools has been blamed for the exorbitant fee structures that at most times deny children their right to education.

“Each county government shall, in promoting the right to early childhood education, provide free and compulsory early childhood education in public education centers within the county,” the proposal states.

The proposed bill will further ensure a sense of professionalism as when approved, the bill will also require those serving as ECDE teachers to at least have a diploma qualification and be registered by the Teachers Service Commission.

The bill also outlaws the provision of examinations to gauge the learner and for the transition to the next class for the young ones in nursery school.