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More than 10,000 newly-promoted teachers have until today to report to their workstations.

Last week, Teachers Service Commission (TSC) chief executive Nancy Macharia told MPs the commission was mapping out the said teachers after they applied for promotion through an online platform.

The 10,833 teachers will teach in Junior Secondary Schools (JSS) after they met the requisite qualifications for deployment.  “The commission has done thorough verification of personal files and identified 10,833 primary school teachers with the requisite qualifications as eligible for deployment to Junior Secondary Schools. They are supposed to report by Monday, February 20,” said Macharia.

Continuous process

She added: “The mapping of primary school teachers eligible to teach in JSS is a continuous process and verification of the mapped files is still ongoing to identify more eligible teachers.”

According to TSC, the qualifications for deployment to JSS include a Diploma in Education, Bachelor’s Degree in Education, at least a C+ (plus) mean grade at Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE), or its equivalent, at least C+ (plus) in the two teaching subjects at KCSE, or its equivalent, as well as eight units in each of the two teaching subjects.

The deployment will boost the 30,550 primary teachers who were distributed to JSS for Grade Seven, out of which the commission allocated a teacher per class for all Grade Seven classes countrywide.

Said Macharia: “While the teacher establishment for Grade Seven level is 61,000 (at least two teachers per class), the commission had recruited 30,550 teachers (one teacher per class), bringing the teacher shortage at Grade Seven to 30,550.”

The move comes at a time when there is congestion in JSS due to a high number of learners, infrastructural strain and costly fees charged by private institutions.

 The TSC is also expected to commence the hiring of 450 teachers for secondary schools beginning today, following the close of the current recruitment.

Permanent and pensionable

The vacancies arose after TSC recruited 35,550 teachers out of 36,000 allocated slots, out of which 9,000 posts were on permanent and pensionable terms of service for JSS; 1,000 were on permanent and pensionable terms for primary school teachers, 21,550 posts for teacher interns in JSS and 4,000 posts for teacher interns in primary schools.

“As of June 2022, TSC was faced with a teacher shortage of 116,000 (48,327 at primary level and 67,673 in post-primary insitutions countrywide,” said Ms Macharia.

Meanwhile, TSC plans to promote about 25,996 teachers in the financial year 2022/2023, subject to budgetary allocation. Out of these teachers, 11,258 will be promoted in the Common Cadre, which involves teachers in Job Group J (C1), K (C2) and L (C3).

Promotion from Job Group J to K, and K to L, is done after three years of satisfactory performance.

Competitive promotion

A total of 13,717 teachers will be promoted through competitive promotion, where a teacher will be required to make an application online, complete the Teacher Proficiency Course or promotional interview administered by the commission.

Some 1,021 teachers will be promoted through affirmative action in arid and semi-arid lands (Asals) and hard-to-staff areas where the commission allocates an additional five per cent of teaching posts.

Local teachers are recruited and retained in these areas to ensure optimal staffing and stability.