SRC Job Evaluation to Decide Fate of TSC New CPG by 2028 Amid Wage Bill Concerns

Teachers’ Promotion Hopes Now Rest on a 2028 Job Evaluation, and a Watchful SRC

For many Kenyan teachers, a career means waiting. You qualify, you are posted, and then you spend years in the same grade, watching a promotion that depends less on how well you teach than on whether a vacancy opens.

The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) says it has heard that complaint, and its proposed revised Career Progression Guidelines (CPG) are meant to answer it.

The guidelines were released for stakeholder engagement on 9 June 2026, but they are only the first step. Teachers will learn their real fate in 2028, when the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) and TSC complete a joint Job Evaluation exercise that will decide what each new grade is worth.

According to sources, the new CPG could be launched in July 2028. Yet the SRC has warned repeatedly about a ballooning public wage bill, and it has recently suspended new salaries and benefits for some civil servants, particularly county officials.

That has caused uproar and left teachers asking whether a promising reform could be stalled by the same concern.

Why the 2018 guidelines are under fire

The 2018 CPG was built on the 2016 Job Evaluation cycle, which mapped teaching jobs onto a ladder running from T-Scale 5 for a Primary Teacher II to T-Scale 15 for a Chief Principal.

In between sat a thicket of titles: Senior Master I to IV, Deputy Principal I to III, Senior Lecturer I to IV and more.

The Commission itself lists the problems this created: pay disparities between teachers, administrators and curriculum support officers; difficulty aligning school categories with the remuneration structure; unequal treatment of teachers with similar qualifications; a “taller scale structure” that lengthens the time needed to grow; and the mixing of professional and administrative work.

The last two matter most for stagnation. A tall ladder with narrow rungs forces a teacher to clear many hurdles, each demanding years of service and often a vacancy.

And because senior grades were tied to administrative titles, a classroom teacher who wanted to progress was effectively pushed towards management, whether or not they wanted it.

What the new CPG proposes

Two tracks instead of one. The biggest change is the separation of administrative positions from professional growth. Under the new structure, every grade is called “Teacher” followed by a number, with Teacher 1 at the top.

Each grade has an administrative meaning (in primary, Teacher 3 corresponds to Principal, Teacher 2 to Senior Principal and Teacher 1 to Chief Principal) and a classroom growth meaning, held by teachers who stay in the classroom. A teacher who excels at teaching could in principle reach a senior grade without running a school.

A shorter ladder. Career levels across all categories fall from 56 to 43:

Merit at the top. The proposal distinguishes “common cadre” grades, through which teachers progress together, from “competitive” grades.

In primary, Teachers 9, 8 and 7 are entry or common-cadre grades, while Teachers 6 down to 1 are competitive. In secondary, the common cadre covers Teachers 8, 7 and 6, with competition from Teacher 5 upwards.

This is where the promise of promotion based on talent sits, though the proposal does not define what “competitive” means.

Entry by qualification. Primary teachers with a PTE certificate enter at Teacher 9 and diploma holders (DPTE or DTE PP&P) at Teacher 8.

In secondary, diploma holders enter at Teacher 8 and degree holders at Teacher 7. Graduates at the Kenya Institute of Special Education (KISE) enter at Teacher 6. This speaks directly to the complaint about unequal treatment of equally qualified teachers.

Where serving teachers would land

The proposal also maps today’s titles to the new grades. In secondary, Secondary Teacher 3 becomes Teacher 8, Secondary Teacher 2 becomes Teacher 7, and Secondary Teacher 1 becomes Teacher 6.

Senior Masters 3 and 4 move to Teacher 5, while Deputy Principals 2 and 3 and Senior Masters 1 and 2 merge into Teacher 4. Principals and Deputy Principals 1 become Teacher 3.

In primary, Primary Teacher 2 becomes Teacher 9 and Primary Teacher 1 becomes Teacher 8. Senior Teachers 1 and 2 merge into Teacher 7, Deputy Headteachers 2 become Teacher 6, Headteachers and Deputy Headteachers 1 become Teacher 5, and Senior Headteachers become Teacher 4.

Two features stand out. Many grades merge, which could lift teachers who were stuck in the lower grade of a pair but also flattens distinctions some earned the hard way.

And the primary ladder appears to extend higher, since the new structure lists Principal, Senior Principal and Chief Principal posts for primary, where today’s mapping shows no current titles at those levels. Whether any of this is a gain depends entirely on pay, which has not yet been decided.

The road to 2028

That is why the Job Evaluation matters more than the guidelines themselves. The Commission’s own timeline has five steps once the CPG is approved:

1. TSC submits the approved CPG, with job descriptions, to the SRC for Job Evaluation.
2. The SRC and TSC conduct the Job Evaluation jointly.
3. Clinics are held on the results.
4. The SRC and the National Treasury communicate the results and their financial implications to TSC.
5. TSC publishes the results to teachers.

Only at the end of that sequence will teachers see which grade they are placed in and what it pays. Sources point to 2028 for completion, with a possible launch in July 2028.

That would put real changes in teachers’ payslips nearly two years from now, and only if every step goes to plan.

The sequence also shows where the decisive voice sits. TSC designs the structure, but the SRC sets the value of the jobs, and the National Treasury is involved when the financial implications are communicated. A reform that TSC finishes drafting can still be slowed, trimmed or phased in by others.

The wage bill shadow

This is where teachers’ optimism meets a hard constraint. The SRC has warned against a ballooning wage bill, and it has recently suspended new salaries and benefits for civil servants, especially county officials, citing concerns about the cost of public pay. The decision has caused uproar among affected workers, who see it as freezing gains they expected.

For teachers, the lesson is uncomfortable. TSC is by far the largest employer in the public service, and a new CPG that moves large numbers of teachers up the grades, or that raises the pay attached to merged grades, carries a large price tag.

Every merger that lifts someone to a higher grade, every new senior post and every competitive promotion adds to the bill. If the SRC treats the wage bill as the overriding concern, the outcome could take several forms:

• Phased implementation, with benefits spread across several financial years rather than delivered in July 2028.
• Tighter limits on competitive posts, so that merit-based promotion exists on paper but reaches few teachers.
• Conservative grading, in which the Job Evaluation places new grades low on the pay scale.
• Delay, if the National Treasury says the money is not available when results are due.

None of these is announced, and the SRC has not said that the teachers’ CPG will be affected. But the warning and the suspension for county officials show how seriously the Commission takes cost containment, and teachers have reason to read them as a signal. It would be prudent to expect a hard negotiation rather than a straightforward approval.

The wider context adds weight to this. The proposal itself notes that the review was needed to address pay disparities, and the 2025-2029 collective bargaining agreement makes stakeholder engagement a statutory requirement.

Teachers have been told to expect improvement, and expectations are now high. If the Job Evaluation delivers less than teachers anticipate, the disappointment could be sharp.

What teachers should watch

Several questions will determine whether the new CPG delivers on its promise:

• Pay. What will each grade pay, and will anyone’s earnings stagnate or fall in the merger of grades?
• Time in grade. Is there a minimum period before moving up? A shorter ladder helps little if each rung takes a decade.
• Competition rules. What are the criteria for “competitive” grades, who decides, and how can decisions be appealed?
• Number of posts. How many positions will exist in each competitive grade?
• Transition. How and when will serving teachers be placed, and will anyone be disadvantaged during the switch?
• Ceilings. Can diploma holders compete for the higher grades, given that the common cadre stops at Teacher 7 for them?
• The numbers. The summary shows primary regular dropping from eight levels to six, yet the detailed structure lists nine primary grades. Secondary shows eight grades against a Junior and Senior School figure of seven. These need to be reconciled.

Hope, with open eyes

The proposal tackles real problems. Separating classroom and administrative careers recognises that a good teacher is not automatically a good manager.

Fewer levels answer the charge of a ladder that was too tall. Qualification-based entry points deal with unequal treatment.

But a structure on paper is not a pay rise. Between the current proposal and the July 2028 target lie public participation, approval, a joint Job Evaluation and a negotiation with a wage-bill-conscious SRC.

Teachers are right to look forward to a promotion system that rewards talent, and they should use the engagement period to demand clear criteria, transparent timelines and written commitments.

They should also be realistic. For now, the greatest obstacle to the new CPG may not be its design but its cost, and the answer will not be known until 2028.