Education ministry mulls new laws to anchor Munavu taskforce reforms

NAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 5 — The Ministry of Education is considering legislative proposals to anchor the implementation of recommendations by the Presidential Working Group Party on Education.

In a report tabled before the National Assembly, Education Cabinet Secretary Ezekiel Machogu said the ministry had stopped the implementation of a report by the Prof Raphael Munavu-led task force on education reforms.

“There are proposal for possible legislation and amendment that will be brought to the specific committees for consideration by the whole house,” Majority Whip Sylvanus Osoro, who tabled the report, said.

“The implementation of the reforms will not take effect until when the legislation process will be complete,” he added.

The National Assembly had halted the implementation of the education reforms recommended by the task force until the necessary laws are passed through Parliament in line with the Constitution.

The intervention followed a request for a statement by Emuhaya Member of Parliament Omboko Milemba seeking direction on the implementation of education reforms touching on the Constitution and several statutes without legislative backing.

Implementations outside legal confines

National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetangula directed House Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wah to seek a comprehensive statement on the matter from the Ministry of Education, holding that recommendations by the task force were being implemented outside provisions of the law.

“I repeat nobody, no minister of government can purport to make law or do things that appear to be in the predicate that they have made law because they have no capacity to make any law,” said Wetangula.

Some of the proposed recommendations include reviewing of entry grades for pre-service teachers which the House Speaker said jeopardize the legal mandate of TSC. 

Others are the scrapping of the categorization of secondary schools and the removal of compulsory subjects for career choices.

The Munavu task force endorsed the competence-based curriculum and recommended its continuation.

It, however, called for a review of learning areas and content to reduce overload and overlaps.

It also made recommendations aimed at improving the quality of learning, teacher education and management framework and processes, integration of technology in education, equity and access with a focus on addressing the plight of those in marginalized areas and education for special needs learners.

Other issues addressed are the funding of both basic and higher education, including recommendations for minimum essential packages for basic education schools and revised capitation, and the introduction of a new funding formula for students in higher learning institutions.

Clipping TSC wings

Under the changes aligned with the transition to CBC at the high school level, the party recommended that learners have options in subjects that will determine their careers.

In this aspect, learners would choose between combinations like English or Kiswahili, Maths or Science, and any other five subjects at the O-level of study; this accompanied by a leaner number of subjects at the Junior Secondary School level.

he party also asked the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) to rationalize the number of learning areas at Junior High. Students take up to 14 subjects under the current framework.

The party’s recommendations would significantly change the functions of the Teachers’ Service Commission (TSC), including empowering it to employ nursery teachers, a mandate vested on county governments.

The changes suggested would also sought to trim TSC’s powers by stripping it of the function of regulating the teaching profession and leaving it with only the performance of its human resource function.