The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) will start to recruit Early Childhood Development and Education (ECDE) teachers should President Ruto approve the proposals of the Education Taskforce.
The term of the Presidential Working Party on Education Reforms (PWPER) came to an end yesterday after presenting its final report to the president.
Though the Council of Governors proposed to employ ECDE teachers on permanent terms and pay those with Certificates sh24387, those with Diplomas sh34395, and Graduates sh46,494 per month this is not happening in most counties.
In fact many counties are yet to employ the teachers on permanent terms. This means majority of ECDE teachers are working on contract terms and are paid varying salaries with the term ‘caregivers’ been used to refer to them.
This will be the second attempt to move employment of ECDE teachers to TSC after the initial one was thwarted by the Labour and Relations Court.
The constitution mandates TSC to register trained teachers and also recruit and employ those registered and assign them for service in any public school or institution.
However Schedule 4 of the constitution outlines pre-primary and vocational training as functions of the County Governments.
County governments are mandated to oversee pre-primary education and childcare facilities, including the recruitment of the teachers.
Majority of ECDE teachers however want to be moved from counties payroll, saying it is discriminative and unpredictable.
The team proposed a change in the role of TSC in managing the ECDE teachers once the proposal is adopted.
The team says ECDE teachers with Diplomas should be placed in same job group as P1 teachers and to be paid same salaries and allowances.