Primary school Deputy headteachers who were promoted without following Career Progression Guidelines (CPG) for teachers could find themselves in hot soup.
This also include Deputy headteachers who are in acting capacity but did not go through the set guidelines to warrant them their current a ting position.
According to CPG a teacher cannot skip two job groups in any form of promotion. In CPG one must serve in one job group for a period of at least three years before moving to the next.
For example a teacher in job group C2 can only get promoted to job group C3 before going to job group C4. However it is not possible for the teacher to move directly from C2 to C4.
A good number of teachers were issued with promotion copies from their TSC County Directors offices to act as Deputy headteachers.
Some of the teachers however are not eligible according to CPG. They are in job group C2 others are even in C1 yet one must serve as a senior teacher I in job group C3 to be considered.
They are Deputy headteachers in acting capacity and were hoping to apply for confirmation through the just recalled TSC promotions but the system locked them out.
The situation is however different for teachers in ASAL and Hard to staff areas. In such areas a teacher can skip job groups because promotion is on affirmative action.
TSC cancelled the advert for 14,738 promotion vacancies after mass protests from various teachers including the administrators in acting capacity.
In the advert 3,392 slots went to secondary school while 11,346 went to primary schools. The vacancies arose from retirements, resignations or deaths. Many teachers have also been holding managerial positions in acting capacity.
Some primary school teachers who were left out in the promotion advert like B5 and C1 said there promotion should be automatic upto job group C2.
They wondered why TSC created two senior teacher position i.e C2 and C3 which represent senior teacher II and I respectively.
Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) Chairman Omboko Milemba backed the cancellation and asked the TSC to increase the number of vacancies.
He added that very many deserving teachers would be left out.
“People deserving promotion are not the target of the advertisement. These are teachers in C3 and C4 job groups. It is a drop in the ocean,” Mr Milemba said.
Mr Milemba blamed the commission for not promoting teachers, thus making them lose benefits.
He said that his office is working on data to establish the extent of the problem and what teachers are owed. He put the figure at more than Sh1 billion.
“This is a pending bill that’s not qualified. It is exploitation of labour by the TSC and government. I’ve put a question in Parliament but I’m doing research with my office staff to back the numbers up. It’s become impossible to be promoted unless you’re in administration,” the Emuhaya MP said.
Nairobi Kuppet Branch Secretary-General Moses Mbora said stagnating in one grade for long has demotivated teachers.
“C3 grade is where teachers have stagnated most. Slots were advertised for D4 grade yet there are many principals in D3 who deserve promotion. Principals were interviewed for promotion to D4 grade in April but nothing happened. We’ve seen another advertisement and their positions are not mentioned,” Mr Mbora said.
He added that having many principals and chief principals and failing to promote deputies would create a succession crisis.
Mr Mbora said stagnating in a job group denies teachers benefits like enhanced medical cover.
“Such a teacher loses on better pension because it is pegged on basic pay,” Mr Mbora said.
He called for the abolition of the career progression guidelines TSC uses to promote teachers and revert to the schemes of service.
“The career progression guidelines are hurting teachers. There are too many salary points,” he said.
Orwa Jasolo, Kuppet’s Migori County Executive Secretary, echoed Misori’s sentiments saying job groups C3 and C5, which form the bulk of post-primary school classroom teachers (80 per cent), were never allocated a share in the advert by TSC.
When commissioners officials appeared before the Education Committee, they were hard-pressed to explain why promotion has not been going on.
“The commission has not been granted additional budgetary allocations for the promotion of teachers for the past 10 years except in July 2017,” TSC Chief Executive Nancy Macharia said, adding that promotion is consequently based on vacancies arising from natural attrition.