Prof. Fatuma Chege of the Ministry of Education’s State Department for Curriculum Reforms has confirmed that Junior Secondary Schools will be housed in secondary schools. Additionally, the schools will have own set of administrators.
Prof. Chege, who sought to clarify the ongoing debate over the placement of the first batch of Grade Six candidates under the 2-6-3-3-3 curriculum to Junior Secondary Schools, emphasized that while there are primary schools that will host Junior Secondary Schools, the management and administration in such cases will be independent of the primary school.
“There should be no confusion between domiciling, hosting or accommodating. If you are accommodated, you are a guest, similarly when you are hosted, you are a guest, but when you are domiciled, then you belong there legally,” she emphasized.
The PS clarified that if a Junior Secondary School class is accommodated in a primary school’s surplus classrooms for any reason, that is merely accommodation; they do not belong to the primary school; they are domiciled in the secondary sub-sector.
She stated that the section will thus have its own Board (Administrators) and that if the government wishes to establish a Junior Secondary School using the existing infrastructure in a primary school, then that primary school will have a Junior Secondary School.
The PS was speaking at St. Maria Goretti Ruruguti Secondary School in Othaya, Nyeri County, where she dedicated the first complete classroom built as part of the Competence-Based Curriculum project.
The County planned to build a total of 166 classrooms. The State is building 11,000 classrooms across the country at a cost of Sh8.1 billion.
As the country transitions from the 8-4-4 to the Competency-Based Curriculum, the new classes will provide additional learning space for the more than one million students who will enter Junior Secondary School next year (CBC).
Prof. Chege was accompanied on the inspection tour by the Sub-County Education Officers, Deputy County Commissioners, and area Chiefs who have been monitoring the construction of the CBC classrooms.
