Knut boss Wilson Sossion says it’s a political and public relations exercise
Knut secretary general Wilson Sossion has rubbished the move by Education CS Fred Matiang’i to pay surprise visits to schools.
He said the decision is a public relations gimmick with political agenda.
Speaking to the press after the launch of the Annual Learning Assessment Report at the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development, Sossion said the disclosures from Matiangi’s visits are shocking.
He said the CS has no capacity to visit the nearly 30,000 schools in the country.
“We have no sustainable workable supervision framework. The system collapsed long ago and instead of Matiang’i playing the fool out of us, he should know how to do things, open his mind and bring uniform and acceptable standards that guarantee quality and equity in learning institutions,” Sossion said.
He said there are no quality assurance personnel to inspect schools, and the system has collapsed to an extent that there are no quality assurance reports, both at the national level and in the counties.
“I want to urge my brother Matiang’i to leave the task to quality assurance personnel who in the end will provide various reports on the status of education in the entire country,” Sossion said.
He said every county deserves its own report so mechanisms to improve the standards can be worked out as per need.
“The decline in education quality and standards is currently experienced even in our universities. They have turned into massfication and business entities that no longer mind about research that would help improve the economy,” Sossion said.
He said the problem starts from poor policy on Early Childhood Development and Education programmes.
The unionist said although the government has adopted the UN policy on early childhood education, it has shown no commitment to implement it.
“It is such a shame that our children are two years behind their expected grades and a 13-year-old cannot tackle a standard two test simply because we got our objectives wrong on implementation of SDG agenda,” he said.
Sossion said all teachers are ready to receive quality assurance officers at any time.
“I want to tell the CS not to get controversial. Get professional and listen to everyone’s views. Let us avoid political sides and focus on issues that need to be fixed for the country to invest more in quality of education,” he said.
(+) CS visits many schools since his appointment
Education CS Fed Matiang’i has made suprise visits to many schools since he was moved from the ICT to the Education ministry last year. InJanuary, he demoted a primary school head teacher in Mombasa after an impromptu visit to the school. Matiang’i had visited Majaoni Primary School in Shanzu to find out for himself how cash was was being used and whether teachers were attending classes as required. The CS arrived unannounced early in the morning, accompanied by several ministry and Teachers Service Commission officials. He was surprised and unhappy when he found out that the headteacher, Welington Mwatsama, had no tangible explanation for how the Free Primary Education money allocated to the school had been spent. Records on how the money had been spent were poorly kept in untidy rooms.