New promotions to favour teachers in hardship areas
Teachers Service Commission (TSC) will adopt a promotion system that gives priority to teachers in disadvantaged parts of the country.
Yesterday, the commission’s Legal and Industrial Relations Director, Cavin Anyuor, explained that teachers in arid and semi-arid lands (ASAL) would be accorded special attention in the promotion system.
“The issue of promotions in ASAL areas will be treated as special because we cannot have teachers coming from advantageous regions competing for promotional vacancies with those from arid and semiarid areas,” said Anyuor.
He made the remarks while responding to principals on the criteria for promotion of teachers, during the Kenya Secondary School Heads Association (KSSHA) annual forum in Mombasa, which closes today.
Implementation of CBA
The teachers had also urged TSC to ensure full implementation of the 2021/25 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), which outlines modalities for promotion, among other things. TSC defended stagnation in promotion of teachers, saying that clause 9 of the CBA articulates the issue of promotion, especially for teachers in ASAL areas.
The teachers insisted that the CBA provides for progressive promotion in a period of three years when they should be moved to the next grade until they reach the highest D5 grade. Anyuor, however, said the employer will put into consideration affirmative action as it is included in the CBA to ensure equal distributions of promotion positions.
KSSHA data shows the number of teachers with masters and doctorate degrees in service stood at 1,725 in 2016, compared with 2,453 in 2020. KESSHA chairman Kahi Indimuli lamented that interviews for promotions were pegged on the schools’ level, a situation that locks out the majority of principals seeking to get higher grades.
“The challenge we have faced as principals is that the interviews appear to be pegged on the type of school one is heading. If I am heading a sub-county school and there is an opportunity to move, I am not called for interviews because of the school I am in,” said Indimuli.
Reorganisation of funds
He added school heads do not choose to be where they are but are posted by their employer.“The question that principals are asking is, how come now that I have been sent to that school I cannot be called for interviews? Let us not peg promotions to the type of school one is heading,” he stated.
Indimuli also proposed the creation of new grades that will see principals in the highest job group (grade D5) promoted to senior chief principals. He called for reorganisation of funds in education sector to cater for promotion of head teachers so as to resolve the issue of stagnation.
Need for more teachers
Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (KUPPET) secretary general Akello Misori had said there was a need to increase the number of teachers and effect promotions.
He said reviews of lower cadres of staff is required, adding that the government has only reviewed the upper cadres of teachers. The union is calling for the implementation of the 2021-25 CBA that pushes for an increase in salaries and allowances, as well as hiring more teachers for public schools.
“So far, we have a teacher deficit of over 115,000 and yet the government has continued to push for 100 per cent transition from primary to secondary schools. How do you say you want to rationalise teaching in schools with this kind of deficit?” he asked.
