Blow to Primary Heads as ECDE, Primary & JSS Funds Managed By Accountants

Next year, in 2024, the government will hire accountants and accounting clerks through the Ministry of Education to guarantee prudent use of funds allotted to nursery, primary, and junior secondary schools.

This is in response to a suggestion made by the Presidential Working Party on Education Reforms (PWPER), which also suggested merging the junior secondary and primary grades into one unit.

According to fresh recommendations from the school reforms team, the single entity that includes all three levels will be referred to as the Comprehensive School and will be led by a principle.

The teachers in charge of the nursery, primary, and junior schools will support the principal and be referred to as deputy principals.

If implemented, the change will result in an increase in the number of students, teachers, and resources available for primary schools.

According to data from the Education Ministry, there are currently at least 10 million students in these schools studying in classes from one through eight.

With the modifications, there will be two courses for pre-primary, six classes for primary schools, and three classes for junior high, bringing the total number of classes from the previous eight to 11.

This will consequently result in an increase in the number of students. The new head (principal), in addition to directing operations at all three levels of the school, will also manage classes one through eight, as was the case under 8-4-4. This implies that the principal will organise and supervise the infusion of millions of shillings into the institutions.

The Presidential Working Party on Education Reforms has suggested that nursery students get government capitation as well.

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In addition, the panel has suggested that capitation per child be reviewed.

The team suggests adding the principal as a signatory to the pre-primary, primary, and junior school bank accounts.

The government will contribute through capitation, a minimum essential package, family contributions, and sponsors to the comprehensive schools.

In contrast to 8-4-4, government support for institutions will be distributed in two levels. The first level is capitation, which will be based on the number of students at a school and which the team suggests be increased.

The other idea is to offer a flat-rate bundle known as a minimum essential package that will change depending on the degree of education.

Each nursery school student will earn Sh1,170 from the government each year under the revised capitation.

Every primary school student will receive Sh2,238 per year, while junior secondary students will receive Sh15,043. Each senior high school student will receive about Sh22,527 annually.

For nursery schools, special needs students would receive an additional subsidy of Sh604 and for primary school students, further allocation of Sh3,624.

Students with special needs would receive an additional Sh10,000 in junior secondary and senior school.

The government will provide the majority of the funding for the comprehensive school in public institutions, but there will also be other support channels for distributing funds.

Analysis demonstrates the team’s desire to increase the funding sources and mechanisms for educational institutions.

The minimal basic package follows. This will cover education-related costs regardless of the enrollment at the institutions, and it will be crucial in supporting universities with a small enrollment.

Pre-primary education will receive Sh70,200, primary education will receive Sh536,880, junior school will receive Sh1,632,120, senior school will receive Sh1,890,000, and special needs education will receive Sh2,060,940.

This means that as part of the minimum necessary package, a comprehensive school will receive a total of Sh2,239,200.

Regardless of the student population in schools, the minimum basic package will cover financial commitments in educational institutions.

This was deemed necessary since certain schools are unable to enrol the requisite number of students in order to function at their best.

The report states that this makes it challenging for them to earn enough money through capitation to pay for both constant and variable costs, such as BOM charges, mail, rental boxes, telephone, and internet access in administration and teaching.

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Direct household contributions from wealthy families will be a crucial source of finance for the comprehensive school in order to ease the burden on the government’s resources; this method will be known as the equity-based funding model.

This is comparable to the method now used under the new university finance model, where students from low-income households receive educational help from the government in the form of scholarships, while students from more affluent families receive larger loans that must be repaid once they graduate from college.

It is also one of the ideas put forth by the late George Magoha, the former secretary of the cabinet for education, to alleviate the financial gap for educational institutions.

Blow to Primary Heads as ECDE, Primary & JSS Funds Managed By Accountants

It also mimics the long-standing policy of the esteemed Starehe Boys Centre, in which students from wealthy families pay higher tuition and those from lower-income families pay next to nothing.

The reforms team hasn’t decided on the amount of household contribution that the “well-off” families are expected to make or how to identify the households who must pay, though.

If all goes according to plan, the comprehensive schools will experience a sharp rise in the workforce.

According to TSC data, there are presently 44,496 nursery school instructors who live in primary schools;

There are 223,296 instructors working in primary schools. According to the Teachers Service Commission’s forecasts, there is currently a demand for 70,430 junior secondary schools, and by 2024, that demand is predicted to increase to 120,923.

Thus, by 2024, there may be 390,000 instructors working in comprehensive schools.

With the continued hiring of 20,000 interns, the principal will have a sizable human resource.

This is more than the 347,000 teachers who are now employed as elementary and secondary school teachers combined.

The team’s recommendation for infrastructure development is that the ministry of education renovate underutilised and underenrolled classrooms in primary schools in urban and rural areas within two years to serve junior school students.

The team suggests that Sh4,000 of the capitation be granted each learner for the first five years to support the development of the infrastructure.

The team suggests that this be completed in two years and will be used to build laboratories, extra classes, and other necessary learning facilities beneath junior school.

The ministry is urged by the study to renovate junior school-ready classrooms in underutilised and underenrolled primary schools in urban and rural locations during the same time frame.

The panel also suggests that the infrastructure development fund be distributed to the constituencies by the minister of education in six months.

Blow to Primary Heads as ECDE, Primary & JSS Funds Managed By Accountants

This will reduce bottlenecks in the delivery of infrastructure development, the team notes.

The team also suggests a structure to resurrect the Digital Literacy Programme project and kickstart digital literacy in the comprehensive school.

The Uhuru Kenyatta administration designated the DLP project as one of its signature initiatives in 2013.

When the scheme began in 2016, the Uhuru-led government bragged that it had given tablets to 95% of Class 1 students, but usage has remained low ever since.

In 2019, the government decided to create computer labs for 23,000 public primary schools rather than continuing its emphasis on laptop distribution.