Here is the Speech by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) boss Dr. Nancy Njeri Macharia; during the release of the 2019 Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) results on Monday November 18, 2019;
“TALKING POINTS FOR DR NANCY MACHARIA DURING THE RELEASE OF RESULTS OF THE KCPE 2019 EXAMINATION RELEASE AT THE KKEC OFFICES ON NOVEMBER 18, 2019
1. KUDOS TO ALL TEACHERS AND CANDIDATES
I wish to appreciate all our teachers for successfully guiding, and teaching, the candidates until they sat the KCPE. Many times, the teachers play the parental role even more than the biological parents themselves. For this, the TSC – as an employer – cannot thank them enough. Please keep up the good work.
I can also not fail to thank the candidates for being obedient and accepting the guidance of the teachers and parents. You deserve the academic success that we are celebrating through the results being released today.
2. EXCELLENT CONDUCT OF SUPERVISORS, INVIGILATORS AND EXAMINERS
During the 2019 KCPE examination, thousands of teachers were engaged as centre managers, supervisers, invigilators, and examiners. These assignments required of them to rise up as early as 5am daily. As a matter of fact, we wouldn’t be here were it not for the teachers’ work. The TSC, therefore, wishes to celebrate these teachers for their sacrifice. They deserve more because the 2019 KCPE examination has recorded the least number of malpractices ever. I note with satisfaction that 99.99 per cent of the teachers did their work perfectly.
The TSC will soon recognise the teachers who took extra-ordinary steps to stop cheating in the KCPE examination.
However, we also will investigate the conduct of 56 teachers who caused some missteps during the administration of the KCPE.
3. STAFFING UNDER THE 100% TRANSITION
We all recognise that the increased enrolment in our public secondary schools has strained the existing teachers with increased workload. To address this, the TSC recruited 5,000 secondary school teachers this year, and is in the process of hiring 10,000 interns to ease the shortage.
We are also replacing those who leave through natural attrition on a continuous basis. The TSC beseeches our teacher to do all they can to ensure high quality learning for our children.
4. COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENT FOR TEACHERS
We recognise that our teachers need to getter better terms of service even as we demand more from them. As a result, we have already initiated the process of negotiating the 2021-2025 CBA. We hope we can conclude the CBA in good time to ensure our teachers can benefit from improved terms.
5. CONTINUING TEACHER PREPARATION FOR CBC
The TSC is determined to adequately retool teachers to be able to handle CBC in all primary school grades. Starting December 2, 2019, the Commission will retool 100,900 teachers on CBC delivery at a cost of Sh580 million. By the end of the training, the Commission would’ve trained 228,000 on CBC in 2019.
We thank our teachers for embracing this exercise of Continuing Teacher Development.”
