It may be impossible to increase the salary of teachers in 2022 despite the Teachers Service Commission being pushed by KNUT and KUPPET. It is after new details emerged that the commission has been allocated much less than what it requested.
It has emerged that the TSC has been allocated 2.5 billion to hire 5,000 teachers on permanent and pensionable terms for 100 per cent transition, as against the 25,000 teachers requested earlier. The commission also requested the recruitment of 12,000 interns, but only 6,000 have been approved at a cost of 1.2 billion.
According to TSC CEO Nancy Macharia, around 1.15 billion will be used to train teachers on competency based curriculum (CBC).
The training will target teachers of languages in grades 1, 2 and 3. It will also target the training of secondary school heads of departments in CBC and school administration.
She said sh. 2.52 billion will be spent in preparation for 2023 to train teachers for grades 6 and 7 when the first CBC group moves to junior secondary.
Another Sh342.4 million will be used for national biometric enrollment and verification of teachers. Macharia said that the teacher performance appraisal and development (TPAD) and implementation of the performance contract will cost $10 million.
The budget completely ignores additional pay for teachers, which means that even if unions succeed in reversing a cashless CBA, teachers may not get a pay hike this year in primary and secondary.