Education sector leadership has failed the nation for too long

President William Ruto receives the Presidential Working Party on Education Reform report as DP Rigathi Gachagua and Education CS Ezekiel Machogu look on. [PCS]

In our national desire and bid to reform the education sector, we have lacked a dream carrier of excellence. Since 2003, the sector has had only two Cabinet ministers (secretaries) who embodied a fortitude and aspiration to transform it. Unfortunately, they are all dead. I am talking of Prof George Saitoti and Mutula Kilonzo (May their souls Rest in Peace).

The other holders of the office wield big sticks, engage in ‘management by walking around’ and fail to stop and think about the long-term goals.

The education leadership has failed the nation. Education should be the basis for national planning but as matters stand, the Cabinet Secretary is unlikely to tell you from the top of his head how many schools there are in Kenya and how many learners are enrolled.

The numerous attempts to jump-start the moribund Education Management System always hits a snag because no one really believes and dreams that it should happen. Fruition of the system does not reside even remotely in the leaderships agenda of the ministry.

To put this into perspective, see what befell the sector under the 100 per cent transition? We failed to plan for the numbers. Many schools are bursting at the seams and there was no concrete plan to expand infrastructure and hire more teachers.

Currently, we have no clear transition plan for Junior Secondary School. We transit one grade to the next and close our eyes and hope for the best. We are literally groping in the dark as we hope for day break.

In our failing to plan, we are lagging behind on teacher recruitment and continuous professional development. This is due to the delayed approvals for teaching and learning material. We show desire but lack the fortitude and courage to act.

The primary purpose of education is to improve the lives of people through knowledge acquisition. If our education system and structure is dysfunctional, in settling for less, we move farther away from progress and democracy.

Education is not only a right; it is a facilitative right. It is a catalyst for the realisation of other rights. Its sanctity has to be protected with higher than usual political platitudes. All other cardinal rights can only be enjoyed fully and or meaningfully when the provision of education covers the nakedness of inequity and lack of quality.

Our improvement in education is chaotic because we lack a singular sense of direction on what we want and our definition of how quality education reform looks like if fluid and temporal. We lack a national criterion which we need to be measuring or evaluating education reform. We have no compass to guide how far we should be reforming and to tell us which reforms are going in the right direction.

These gaps need to be addressed in terms of our long-range goals for education reform. These goals should give us the basic agenda and allow us to plan on strategies and tactics that will nudge the sector towards the envisaged goal.

For all these things to fall into place, the education sector needs a dreamer. The dream needs to be anchored and carried from one point to the next. We need to find someone who fits the bill. It is time we demanded as a nation that the Executive puts in place someone with the right credentials.  We cannot continue burying our heads in the sand while our heritage to our children and future generations is toyed around with. Over to you, Mr President.

 Mr Wesaya is an education and strategy expert