Thousands of secondary school (Senior School) teachers are set to start training on the Competency Based Education (CBE) formerly known as Competency Based Curriculum (CBC).
The Ministry of Education through Centre for Mathematics Science Technology Education in Africa (CEMASTEA) has rolled out training for the teachers as first CBC cohorts are set to transition to Grade 10 in January 2026.
Already training for around seven thousand senior school principals who will oversee the implementation of the curriculum is underway.
CEMASTEA has listed the first batch of teachers targeted for this training which will happen in August this year.
Targeted teachers for this first round of training are those teaching Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects.
They are Mathematics, Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Agriculture, Home Science and all Technical subjects teachers.
Already the details for the teachers were forwarded by the school principals to CEMASTEA through an online form.
CEMASTEA had given till 23rd June for filling and submission of the teachers data to enable it prepare for the capacity building programme.
In a circular the Centre CEO, Jacinta Akatsa, says the training aims to build capacity of senior school STEM teachers on CBE.
“This will go a long way in the realization of the Ministry’s policy of having 60% of learners pursuing STEM education,” she added.
Currently the Grade 9 learners are finalizing selection of senior schools, pathways and subjects combination they will do in senior school.
The exercise which started on 9th June and planned to end on 30th June seeks learners to select one pathway where STEM pathway shall be compulsory.
The Grade 9 learner will also select twelve senior schools of choice where 9 will be boarding schools (3 from the learners’ home county and 6 from outside their home county) and 3 will be day schools.
In senior school (Grades 10-12) learners shall take 7 subjects where 4 are core subjects; English, Kiswahili/KSL, Community Service Learning and Physical Education while 3 shall be selected from the pathways and tracks of choice.
CBC was first introduced in 2019 at Grade 3. Piloting of the curriculum was done in 2017 where in 2018 the national piloting exercise was carried out in schools across the 47 counties.
However its implementation is still facing headwinds over acute teacher shortage.
TSC CEO Nancy Macharia who had appeared before the Senate National Cohesion and Equal Opportunities Committee said the Commission needs 26,039 teachers to address staffing gap in senior schools.
She said it needed sh70 billion to recruit 98,461 teachers for both junior and senior school in order to address the current shortage.
TSC has so far recruited 68,313 teachers for junior schools on permanent and pensionable terms.
“I would like to inform the Senate that if TSC is allocated Sh70 billion, we will be able to employ all the teachers needed in our schools. In Junior Secondary, we have a shortage of 72,442 teachers, while in Secondary schools under the 8-4-4 system, we have a shortage of 26,039 teachers,” said Macharia.
TSC has so far retooled a total of 229,292 primary school teachers on CBC from April 2019 to September 2021 while a total of 60,642 JSS teachers were trained from May to November 2024.
Currently a total of 20,000 JSS intern teachers are still going on with trainings organized by CEMASTEA and TSC.
