By Obegi Malack
obegimalack@gmail.com
If the election petition yet to be filed against William Ruto’s presidential win in the just concluded general elections flops, Kenyans will be hot on the heels of the President-Elect to make sure he fulfils the promises he made to completely overhaul the education sector for the better.
The outgoing Deputy President who previously had served as the Minister for Higher Education promised to ensure all children have access to equitable, quality and free early childhood, primary and secondary education with 100 per cent transition through each level.
“As part of our effort to ensure access to education for all children, my government shall strategically promote the construction of low-cost boarding schools in Arid and Semi-Arid Locations (ASAL) to accommodate pastoralist communities,” he added.
In addition, he pledged to implement a school feeding programme that will see eight million children receive free meals from the current two million.
On the sensitive Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) agenda, Ruto shelved his initial plan to scrap the system and revert to 8-4-4; instead promising to commit to continue engaging the public and education stakeholders to facilitate the assessment of the current curriculum and education structure towards finding a sustainable solution that will capture the essence of a knowledge-based system.
The president-elect further made sure to cater for the girl child by pledging to ensure school girls receive free sanitary towels throughout their education, in addition to implementing a return-to-school formula for teenage mothers who will also receive automatic bursaries upon resumption of studies.
“Provision of sanitary towels will reduce dropouts and absenteeism due to lack of female hygiene products,” he had said during the official launch of the Kenya Kwanza Women’s charter at the Nyayo Stadium.
As part of the commitment to boost enrollment of women in learning institutions, the leader promised incentives for women to excel in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), and said they will introduce a special institute for women in the Kenya School of Government to build their leadership capacity.
In an education forum at the Catholic University of East Africa (CUEA) on June 23, 2022, Ruto promised to abolish the teacher delocalization policy and replace it with one that appreciates teachers as a national resource.
To add on to that, he said he will employ 58,000 teachers for Ksh25 billion per year for two years to address the current teacher shortage that stands at a deficit of 116,000 teachers.
Furthermore, he pledged to introduce a one to two-year paid national internship programme for all graduands through a collaboration scheme with the private sector irrespective of the discipline studied.
To bridge the current higher education funding gap of up to 45 per cent, his government will establish National Skill & Funding Council that will amalgamate HELB, TVET, and University Funding Board and to make the deal better, he will establish a National Education Fund to mobilize grants, bursaries and scholarships from private and public sponsors.
He said the Education Fund will double the current Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) funding from 11 billion to 22 billion and make the loan interest-free.
Ruto finally pledged to establish more vocational training centres in every Ward and ensure every constituency has a fully equipped Technical Training and Vocational Educational Training (TVET) institution in the first two years.
