Musalia asks govt to give Kenyans definitive roadmap on education – KBC

Amani National Congress (ANC) leader Musalia Mudavadi has called on the Ministry of Education to give Kenyans definitive messages on the way forward on the fate of learning and especially on this year’s KCPE and KCSE examinations.

In a statement Wednesday, Musalia said the outbreak of coronavirus gave the country no chance to plan what to do with our education and institutions of earning and now the fate of some 1.2 million Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) candidates and 700,000 Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) candidates hangs precariously in the balance.  Noting that in all, about 15 million learners, who should be in school or college, are at home.

“While  it  is  possible  to  appreciate  the  fears  that led to the rushed closure of institutions of learning, it is difficult to come to terms with  the reality that the Ministry  of  Education  is  this  far still sending  out speculative  messages on  the  fate  of  learning;  and  especially  on  this  year’s KCPE  and  KCSE examinations.” He said.

He noted that so far the Ministry of Education has only made random and Ad Hoc pronouncements.

“As  the  bug  continues  to  remain  with  us,  it  is expected that the Ministry of Education could get bona fide leaders of the key  stakeholder entities  in education in a constructive dialogue, to  reflect  together  and  plan the  way  forward.  These casual  and  abrupt statements  have mostly  been  given  in  the SIDELINES of  Ministry  of  Health briefings  on  Covid-19.  The statements have only left the country confused and in limbo. Learners are in limbo, as are the teachers and parents.” Said Musalia.

He said education is the mother of all the other sectors and must demonstrate the highest levels of planning and informed action, as a way of setting the bar for other sectors and as a  sectoral necessity.

“To this end, we must avoid the habit of decrees and lone-ranger approaches of the kind that the Ministry of Education is used to. Jogoo house, the Teachers Service Commission, the teachers’ unions and the Kenya National Examinations Council, must constitute a team to plan what is to be done about education, going forward. They will also need to work with high level representation from the Ministry of Health and the treasury.”

He noted that the state of the art in education is extremely worrying at present as they have not heard of any packages of measures that the ministry has made for parents, teachers and learners to facilitate, equalize and monitor home learning.

“We have heard government officials say that learning is going on, online.  They have also said that national examinations  will  go  on, as  was  scheduled  at  the  start  of  the  year.  We  don’t  know  of  any without clearly defined and equitable state-owned and state facilitated  learning  packages,  it  is  misleading  and  even  mischievous to claim that learning is going on.  It is not.” Said the ANC leader.

The ANC leader said that not every learner has access to radio or TV and less still to the internet and that even those who can physically access the facilities are challenged with the costs of activating them.

“Let us not cheat ourselves. Let us accept that things are bad – indeed very bad – and that we may need to take some very drastic decisions about education, but which decisions are good and necessary for the country, in the long term.

On the school syllabuses, he said they have not been covered and may not be covered.

“Our exam based education is about syllabuses.  We  cannot  change  direction  in  the  midstream,  to  pretend  that  all  is  well,  when  we  know  that exam  syllabuses will  not  be covered. We cannot have exams when syllabuses have not been covered.  It  will  throw  the integrity  of  the  exams and  the  education system into international disrepute. We certainly don’t want to go that way.” He added.

He called for a clear strategic approach to counselling and removal of stigma ahead  of  reopening of some  schools,  colleges  and  universities that  have  been earmarked as isolation centres.

“There are many other challenges ahead of school reopening in  this  covid-19  season.  We  must  above  all  the  foregoing–plan how to deal with the possibility of outbreaks of covid -19 in schools after the learners go back. How do we plan to  manage any outbreaks? Shall we just send our children back to  school without giving this any thought and mitigating against it? Asked Musalia.