Teachers who excel in co-curricular activities will now be promoted automatically without going through the traditional promotion interviews.
Some teachers will be promoted automatically to the next job group based on their consistency performance while others will be awarded scores which will boost their promotions prospects during interviews.
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) already initiated a process to identify teachers who excel in various fields outside classroom.
TSC Director of Staffing, Antonina Lentoijoni, ordered County Directors to develop, maintain, and regularly update an accurate and comprehensive database of teachers who excel in mainstream co-curricular activities at various education levels.
“The database shall be used by the Commission whenever required to support planning, recognition, and other teacher management interventions. Compliance is mandatory, and the records must be readily available upon request,” said Lentoijoni in the memo dated 9th February.
TSC initially used to promote teachers with exemplary performance in outdoor activities including sports, science congress and drama.
However the Commission abandoned the automatic promotions criteria after abandoning Schemes of Service (SoS) and adopted Career Progression Guidelines (CPG) which provided a different guideline for promoting teachers.
Later TSC gave little weight to certificates awarded to teachers for excelling in co-curricular activities.
During promotion interviews the Commission only awarded 2 marks to teachers who presented these certificates.
During the January and February 2025 teacher promotion interviews, TSC for the first time completely scrapped recognition of sports certificates from the promotion interview scoresheets.
Instead TSC awarded scores to teachers who invigilated, supervised and marked the national exams and assessments to encourage teachers to participate in the exercise.
This move sparked protests from teachers who had been awarded for their stellar performance in sports, drama, agriculture, and science competitions.
In 2025 games teachers through their sports bodies wrote to TSC demanding recognition of their certificates in teacher promotion interviews.
The issue of recognition of sports awards by the Commission which was a hot potatoe, was also raised during games teachers clinics who faulted TSC for discrediting them.
Officials of the Kenya Primary Schools Sports Association (KPSSA) and Kenya Secondary School Sports Association (KSSA) asked TSC to review its promotion scoresheet to include games and sports accolades.
In a paradigm shift TSC has now embarked in creating a database which shall capture teachers who excel in mainstream co-curricular activities.
The Commission listed four levels of participation and competition i.e at the Sub-County, County, Regional, National and East African.
The County Directors are required to record teachers in the following co-curricular disciplines, categorized by discipline, education level, role, and level of participation:
a) Sports Primary, Junior School, Senior and SNE Institutions
i Coaches-Position 1, 2 and 3 teams and Position 1 composite activities
ii Referees/Umpires
iii Technical Officials
b) Sports — Teacher Training Colleges (TTCs)
i Coaches Position 1, 2 and 3 teams and Position 1 composite activities
ii Referees/Umpires
iii Technical Teams / Officials
c) Drama and Film — Primary, Junior School, Senior, SNE Institutions and TTCs
i Directors
ii Producers
iii Adjudicators
d) Music (Kenya National Music Festivals) Primary, Junior School, Senior School, SNE Institutions and TTCs
i Directors
ii Adjudicators
e) Kenya Science and Engineering Fair (KSEF)
i Advisors/Mentors
ii Project Directors
iii Technical Teams / Officials iv Judges
TSC asked the Directors to ensure the data captured is accurate, complete, current, and verifiable.
Th records shall indicate the teachers TSC number, BC Name, Institution and level, County, Discipline and specific role, position, Level of participation (Sub-County, County, Regional, National, East African).
“Maintain and update the database annually and submit the records to the Commission whenever required,” ordered Lentoijoni.
TSC acting CEO Evelyn Mitei is currently seeking sh 2 billion in July budget for promotions of 50,000 teachers.
Last year during a meeting with teachers at State House, president William Ruto promised to double teacher promotions from 25,000 to 50,000 by increasing the annual promotion budget.