TSC to hire 11,000 tutors as 300,000 seek vacancy

More than 300,000 tutors who applied for teaching jobs will from Thursday next week know their fate as the selection process and filling of employment forms starts.

A revised schedule for hiring 11,574 teachers shows that merit lists have been generated and sent to county directors ahead of the exercise.

The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) is recruiting 5,000 new staff to support the Government’s 100 per cent transition policy from primary to secondary schools

The remaining 6,574 tutors will be hired to replace those who have exited the teaching service due to natural attrition.

The tutors who applied for the jobs will receive their letters of appointment from county directors between October 8 and 14.

This will give way to another five days of vetting the final lists and handling of complaints, which will also be done at the county level between October 15 and 22.

The schedule indicates that all the returns will be received at the commission's head office between October 23 and 24.

The TSC also announced that it will promote 1,000 teachers.

TSC Chief Executive Officer Nancy Macharia yesterday told the Senate Education Committee that the newly recruited teachers will report to their respective schools by January 4 next year.

In response to a question by senators who wanted to understand the hiring criteria and whether the process will be fair to all qualified teachers, Ms Macharia said the commission has put in place mechanisms to attract, select, appoint and retain competent teachers to serve as institutional administrators.

She said primary school teachers in administrative jobs who fall under Job Group K (C2) will be able to rise to Job Group P, which is the present D1 under the new grading system adopted after a collective bargaining agreement.

Secondary school teachers in the administrative category will be able to rise from Job Group C5 (senior master) to D5 (chief principal).

Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers Secretary General Akelo Misori said they have petitioned TSC to re-instate the common cadre promotion grades.

Mr Misori said the fate of 3,000 diploma teachers who need to transit from Job Group C2 to C3 is in limbo.

On teacher recruitment, Macharia told the senators that the commission needs 103,481 teachers to plug a staff deficit.

The commission has consistently requested for increased budgetary provisions to employ 20,000 teachers annually, and this has not borne fruit,” she said.