Thousands of unemployed P1 and Early Childhood Development Education (ECDE) teachers will struggle since the government has refused to fund their upgrade program.
P1 teachers will upgrade to Diploma in Primary Teacher Education (DPTE), while ECDE teachers will upgrade to Diploma in Early Childhood Teacher Education (DECE). The program will last nine months and include three months of teaching practice (DECTE).
Teachers will be required to pay the fees indicated in the admittance letter, which will come with other conditions, according to an advertisement issued by the Ministry of Education in one of the local dailies concerning the upgrade program.
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Teachers Service Commission (TSC)-registered applicants with valid P1 and ECDE certifications will be accepted for the upgrade program, which will be totally residential and whose application period began on July 29, 2021.
Employed teachers will have to wait a little longer for the school calendar to stabilize before becoming eligible for the school-based upgrading program, according to the advertisement.
The conventional January-December school calendar is expected to resume in January 2023 , according to school calendars issued by former Principal Secretary of Education Dr. Belio Kipsang’.
After it was revealed that no teacher will be registered or employed by TSC in the future unless they have a diploma, the decision to create an upgrading program was made.
Dr. Reuben Nthamburi, Director of Quality Assurance and Standards, developed a framework for teacher entry requirements that required teachers with ECDE, Primary Teacher Education (PTE), and Diploma in Teacher Education (DTE) certificates to have a Post Training Certificate (PTC) to be certified to teach the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC).
Teachers will be guided by CBC Learning Domains and Pedagogy, 21st century teacher education principles and practices, andragogy and Lifelong Learning Assessment, action research, and inclusion, according to the Commission.
Other topics covered by the PTC include coaching and mentoring, as well as identifying and cultivating learner potential.Teachers will also receive training in Blending Content and Pedagogy Micro Teaching, Practicum Supervision and Assessment Reflective Teaching, and Pedagogical and Reasoning over the nine-month upgrade program.
In June of this year, just 1,400 applicants were selected to join DPTE and DECDE. They were allocated to Machakos, Thogoto Kiambu, Shanzu, Egoji, Baringo, and Migori Public Teacher Training Colleges.
The second intake of trainee teachers to Public Diploma Primary Teachers College (DPTC) that was to take place in July this year was postponed to a later date, with the Ministry stating that the process will proceed after necessary logistics wereA total of 24 Teachers Training Colleges (TTCs) which had expected to receive students in the second intake will have to wait for those who will be shortlisted to join the upgrade programme in September this year.
Chairperson of Kenya Teachers College Principals Association (KTCPA) Saul Baraza who is also the Principal at St. Paul Kibabii Diploma Teachers Training College urged those interested in the upgrading programme to apply in large numbers.“We are optimistic that there will be many applicants because I believe that having a diploma will be prerequisite for them to be employed by TSC,” said Mr. Baraza.
He also encouraged them to update their skills so that they are compliant with the current curriculum.TSC has been conducting in-service training of teachers since the CBC was rolled out.The commission has a budget of Sh1 billion for teacher capacity development and targets to train 180,000 teachers on CBC and 23,000 school administrators in the 2021/2022 financial year
The Commission has not trained secondary school teachers on CBC although they are expected to receive the first class in January 2023.The Government had earlier on suspended training of primary teachers in order to phase out P1 certificate courses in TTCs and allow time for development of a curriculum to teach the new diploma course.
According to the CBC taskforce, Pre-Service Competency Based Teacher Education (CBTE) will provide the education sector with a valuable opportunity to train teachers on the CBC approach
The U – Turn Decision
It had initially been rumored that the government was going to fund the teachers in the upgrading program. The announcement had come as good news to the teachers affected.
However, educationupdates.co.ke has established that the government won’t bear the cost of upgrading and the affected teachers will have no option than to fund themselves
CHANGE OF PLAN
Teachers across this country are now happy as the Teachers Service Commission breaks silence on the fate of P1 teachers in this country.
The ministry of education education is currently rushing against the clock to ensure that the new education system known as Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) has been put in place as scheduled by the education stakeholders.Also the ministry of education is now working hard to ensure that the secondary schools have accommodated the great number of the students who are expected to join in form one following the 100% transition which is going to take place.
However the teachers are now happy as Teachers Service Commission breaks silence on the fate of P1
teachers.According to the reliable sources, the Teachers Service Commission will deploy 36,341 teachers who who have acquired higher qualifications to teach at lower secondary schools to meet the staffing needs following the roll-out of new curriculum.
Therefore P1 teachers who hold Diplomas, higher Diplomas, undergraduate Degrees, Post graduate Diplomas, Masters and PHDs will be deployed in the junior secondary schools.So the P1 teachers who hold P1 Certificates will be employed in Primary Schools. This is good news to teachers, especially the unemployed P1 teachers who hold P1 certificates in this country.
In my own opinion,, I think Diploma Upgrade should be Scrapped Off now that tsc has decided to employ P1 Teachers without a diploma. This will be good News To Teachers who are bearing this huge costs.
