By Enock Okong’o
Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) Gucha branch Executive Secretary Mrs Lucy Bwari Machuki has called for the overhaul of the Competence Based Curriculum (CBC) for the stability of education development in the country.
Machuki stated that CBC is too burdensome to the child, teachers and the parents.
Speaking during the funeral of Mama Rebecca Siriba Nyandoro of Mogumo village in Magenche ward, Kisii County, Machuki noted that CBC gives teachers a lot of work.
“Most often, teachers send their pupils to parents to research on some assignments yet some parents do not even have mobile phones or laptops for the task,” said Machuki.
She went on to explain that 8-4-4 should be revived since the curriculum has enough trained teachers.
Machuki appealed to all teachers in the country to denounce CBC because it was ill implemented.
“The government should first increase the salaries of teachers before asking them to be faithful midwives to CBC,” she added.
She went on to add that lack of enough classrooms, teachers and money in the country will prevent CBC from attaining the required success.
She also said that grade 6 learners are too young to transit to Junior Secondary Schools because they might be molested by their seniors in the secondary schools.
The unionist stated that education is a lifelong adventure that should not be treated carelessly because doing so will affect many generations to come.
“Education is very vital hence those in charge of its policies should be wary of any changes affecting it,” she said.
She also said that the union is not against any gainful changes in education hence asked the government to embrace inclusive consultation to enable the stakeholders to work as a team and develop the education sector.
She accused the former regimes of intimidating and enticing teachers to form rival groups which weakened the strength of the teaching fraternity.
“The government knows that a house divided cannot stand. They divided teachers by inciting our rival group the Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (KUPPET),” she said.
The unionist asked the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) to be independent of the government, further claiming that the commission is being used to exploit teachers.
