By Roy Hezron
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) has now released its plan of action in the deployment of 10,833 primary school teachers who requested to be moved to Junior Secondary School (JSS), which comes with a bag of goodies.
In a circular dated February 17, 2023 signed by the commission Secretary and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Dr. Nancy Macharia, priority will be given to proximity to the current station where a teacher is working.
Under the criteria, the commission maintains that teachers should be deployed as close as possible to their current working stations.
The decision comes days after the TSC boss told Parliament that the commission had stopped delocalization, which had been resisted by teachers and their Unions, and transferred over 14,000 teachers back to their home counties.
Subject combination will also be a factor.
Here, unless a station (JSS) requires more than one teacher of the same subject combination, no school will receive more than one teacher.
Another critical is gender in a bid to balance the staff composition in a station, with teachers with Special Needs Education (SNE) qualification being posted to SNE JSS.
Deployment letters will be signed by the TSC sub-county directors for teachers within the sub-county, and county directors in case of extra-sub-county deployments. For the case of Nairobi, the regional director will handle it.
“The sub-county director shall sign two deployment letters for each teacher. One letter shall be issued to the teacher while the second original letter shall be submitted together with other deployment documents for filing at the headquarters,” instructed Dr. Macharia in the circular.
Money implication
Happily, the deployment will come with a basketful of goodies as the basic monthly salary and other related allowances go up.
The circular details how the primary teachers will be converted to higher grades from the ones they are currently holding.
For example, Grade B5 or Primary Teacher II and C1 or Primary Teacher I with a Bachelor’s degree will be issued with appointment letters to Grade C2, which is Secondary Teacher II.
As per TSC Career Progression Guidelines (CPG) for teachers, Secondary Teacher II (T- Scale 7) is the entry grade for secondary school teachers who are holders of a Bachelor’s Degree in Education or its equivalent.
This implies that the teachers will move from their current salary of between Ksh21,756 and Ksh27,195 for B5 teachers, and Ksh27,195 and Ksh33,994 for C1. The new basic monthly salary will be Ksh34,955 to Ksh43,694, with corresponding raises in allowances.
Grade B5 with a Diploma in Education will move to Grade C1 or Secondary Teacher III, which as per the CPG is at T-Scale 6 and the entry grade for secondary school teachers who are holders of Diploma in Education.
Effectively, their basic monthly salary will move from between Ksh21,756 and Ksh27,195 to between Ksh27,195 and Ksh33,994, with a slight increase in almost all the allowances.
Teachers at Grade C2 and above with Bachelors/ Diploma certificates and teachers at Grade C1with a Diploma shall be issued with deployment letters to higher grades, though there are no specifications.
Requirements
According to TSC, primary school teachers wishing to be deployed to JSS must be qualified to teach in secondary school, and must have an active registration with the commission as a teacher.
Further, the teacher must be employed as a primary school teacher with the TSC and should not be currently serving an interdiction or undergoing a disciplinary process.
They should also have a minimum of a Diploma in Education with a minimum C+ at KCSE (or its equivalent), with C+ in two teaching subjects currently being offered in the school curriculum (either under 8-4-4 or CBC), or two principles and one subsidiary pass at “A” Level.
Those with a minimum of C (plain) at KCSE (or its equivalent) and have undertaken a Diploma in Education together with a Bachelor Degree in Education also qualify for deployment.
The degree certificate must be Bachelor of Education, have expressed interest to be deployed to JSS, and their name must appear in the list shared from the headquarters. However, Bachelor of Education (Primary Option) holders are not eligible.
Procedure
Immediately the teachers are deployed to JSS, the county directors will initiate posting on the Posting, Entry/Exit Reports Module to the sub-county to enable the director there to post the teachers.
The head of institution releasing the teacher has, beforehand, been instructed to exit the deployed teacher through the submission of Exit Report to enable the receiving Head to submit the Entry Report, with all the processes being done online.
“Where the teacher is retained in the same station, the head of institution shall exit the teacher from primary school and submit Entry Report for the JSS,” said Dr. Macharia.
After the conclusion of the deployment exercise, the TSC county and regional directors have been instructed to submit to the commission’s staffing director in the headquarters certified copies of the teacher’s academic credentials.
They will further be required to submit the original copy of the deployment letter, a declaration by the head of institution that the teacher is currently serving in the school and is neither serving an interdiction, nor undergoing a disciplinary process, accompanied by a list of the deployed teachers.
