New guidelines for the implementation of Junior Secondary School (JSS) have reduced anxiety among teachers and parents just 10 days before the start of the new phase of the competency-based curriculum (CBC).
Education Cabinet Secretary Ezekiel Machogu said yesterday that President William Ruto had accepted the interim rules, which specify the roles of primary school principals and boards of management, among other things.
The recommendations were submitted to the President when the CS led a delegation of top education sector officials to State House to present the 2022 Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) results. When the students return on January 30, they will be housed in primary schools.
According to the new guidelines, which will be formally issued to schools next week via a circular, head teachers will be the heads of the junior secondary schools that are housed in their particular institutions.
They will also serve as interim principals for the primary school section, which will terminate on December 30, 2023. This is an additional job for principals that will require them to manage secondary school teachers.
The Kenya Educational Management Institute will provide induction training on institutional and instructional leadership to headteachers and their boards of management .
Furthermore, BOMs of public primary schools that will implement JSS will form special sub-committees to oversee the school’s educational and resource management.
“The head of the primary school that domiciles the junior secondary school will serve as secretary while the chairperson will be a member of the committee,” Mr Machogu said.
Additionally, all private schools will be required to establish and operationalise BoMs, boards of directors or boards of trustees, in accordance with Section 52 (a) of the Basic Education Act (2013). Learners joining junior secondary will need to be registered afresh through Nemis.
Capitation per learner
It is also through the system that the capitation of Sh15,000 per learner will be disbursed. Learners in primary schools receive a capitation of Sh1,420.
Mr Machogu said that Sh4,000 of the JSS capitation will be used for infrastructure, especially the construction of laboratories for the teaching of science subjects.
The Ministry of Education is also in talks with the World Bank for the financing of the construction of 7,000 laboratories for JSS.
“The infrastructure and resources of existing primary schools will be utilised by the respective domiciled JSS in the interim one year of transition. This applies to special needs JSS as well,” Mr Machogu said.
To distinguish between learners in primary and junior secondary, learners will wear different types of uniforms.
On the JSS curriculum, the CS said that textbooks and hard copies of the Grade 7 curriculum designs will be made available for all schools. Soft copies of the designs are available on the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) website. According to the chair of the Kenya Publishers Association Kiarie Kamau, distribution of the textbooks will begin on Monday next week.
“We resonate with the CS’s assurance. We’re upbeat to ensure that it happens. We’ll deploy more people and distribution trucks. Also, the weather is favourable and most areas are easily accessible,” he told Daily Nation.
“These guidelines have been validated by stakeholders to spell out the general provisions to be adopted by institutions, organisations and stakeholders, in order to fast track operationalisation of Junior Secondary Schools across the one-year transitional period. The guidelines are interim while awaiting the full report of the Presidential Working party, which is expected in March 2023,” Mr Machogu said.
