Counties to provide free nursery education in new proposal

Counties could soon be compelled to provide free nursery education to children under the age of six if a Bill before Parliament becomes law.

The proposal, County Early Childhood Development Education Bill of 2018, seeks to scrap off fees for children aged between three and five in public nursery schools.

The proposal comes 16 years after the onset of free primary education but with a similar view to provide equal access to education to all children.

It is currently before the education committee in Parliament and awaits to be introduced before the Senate.

It will formulate the law by which all nursery schools are governed. Currently there is no law that governs the institutions.

"Each county government shall, in promoting the right to early childhood education, provide free and compulsory early childhood education in public education centres within the county,” the proposal reads.

Basic education is a right for every child in Kenya. Ironically, this accounts for just primary and secondary school education leaving out pre-primary.

If approved, the bill will also require those serving as ECDE teachers to at least have a diploma qualification and be registered by the Teachers Service Commission.

A parallel proposal that seeks to amend the Basic Education Act has also proposed that the Teachers Service Commission be mandated with the role of employing teachers to these institutions.

Further, the bill outlaws the provision of examinations to gauge the learner and for the transition to the next class.

"An education centre under this Act shall not administer examinations for the purpose of determining admission into the education centre.No pupil admitted in an education centre shall be held back in any class or expelled from the centre," it reads.

The measures seek to provide wider educational opportunities to households raising children, and reducing the financial burdens on those households.

However, it is not certain whether the county governments will be compelled to provide a capitation for each child if adopted.

Japan in December last year also approved a proposal to offer free nursery school.

There are more 40,000 ECDE centres in Kenya, and nearly 70 per cent are attached to a primary school.

According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics 2019, the number of teachers in these institutions stands at slightly above 160,000.

As of 2016, half the numbers of those serving as ECDE teachers had no professional training.

“For children from poor households, the combined effects of inadequate preparation for pre-primary school and low-quality primary education could have significant adverse implications on their school preparedness and opportunities later in life,” Kenya Parents Association chairman Nicholas Maiyo told the Star yesterday.