The Ministry of Education (MoE) has for the first time in history made independent allocations of resources to its Quality Assurance and Standard Officers (QASOs) to facilitate their work in the field.
This will now allow the officers who for many years were known as School Inspectors to visit schools to access safety measures and standards in schools.
Under the new arrangement, Sub-county, County and Regional QASOs will design their programmes and activities and further access the required funds from the Sub-county, County, and Regional Directors of Education as the case will apply for approval.
Education News has established that Sub-county QASOs will access a budget of between KSh260, 000 to KSh400, 000 depending on the size of the sub-county or the population of learners; County QASOs have been allocated between KSh650,000 to KSh1.2 million while Regional QASOs will access between KSh1 million to KSh1.5 million both under similar considerations.
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It is understood that the MoE has plans to release up to KSh300 million per Financial Year to carter for Quality Assurance and Standard (QAS) functions.
This development follows another move by MoE of awarding promotions to QASOs which came earlier than the automatic promotions of education officers which were done recently.
QASOs who spoke to Education News said that they were very motivated to do their work especially after the Ministry also allocated vehicles to assist in traversing various schools in their respective areas of jurisdiction.
MoE conducts several assessments in the schools to foster better learning. Routine inspections are done from time to time to monitor consistency in what has been assessed.
They could also conduct investigative assessments where certain urgent matters are raised about schools in their jurisdiction in order to prepare a report. Sometimes targeted assessments are done to allow for registration of schools or for upgrading of institutions from one level to another.
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There can also be follow-up assessments where the Ministry is not satisfied with a report that had been prepared earlier.
There are close to 400 Sub-county QASOs, 47 County QASOs and at least 8 Regional QASOs across the country who are charged with the responsibility of inspecting schools.
After an assessment has been conducted, education stakeholders are usually summoned for a meeting to discuss the findings of the assessment report conducted by the Officers where all school heads and BoMs are invited where necessary.
Recommendations are then developed and shared with the Ministry headquaters. The Ministry may co-opt lay QASOs such as security officers, NEMA officials, engineers, surveyors, public health officers among others from time to time to help in the assessment of school facilities from time to time.
By Our Reporter
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