Education Ministry- Schools to give details of BOM teachers for processing of their salaries

Schools have been asked to provide data for all teachers employed under the Board of Management (BOM) terms. This will enable the Ministry of Education to process their salaries.

The Ministry has said it must verify the teachers’ details before their salaries can be released.

“The Ministry would like to verify the teachers under the Boards of Management in the schools,” says a memo by Education Principal Secretary, Dr Belio Kipsang.

The memo that has been sent to all County Directors of Education requires them to collate personal records of BOM teachers; including names and TSC numbers.

The Ministry is set to consider teachers who were still in contract with schools by March; when learning institutions were closed as a result of covid-19 outbreak in the country.

“You are required to confirm their employment status in the schools by March 15, 2020,” adds Dr Kipsang.

Last week, the Ministry backtracked on a decision to release funds to schools. The Free Education Capitation monies that had reflected in schools’ National Education Management Information System (NEMIS) were reversed without any further explanations.

Each secondary school learner had been awarded Sh3,725 in the reversed disbursement.

The funds were deposited in the schools’ operations accounts between August 3 and 5, 2020; with no disbursement for the tuition account.

BOM teachers and staff have gone for over five months without salaries.

Early this month, Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha had confirmed that indeed the funds will be released to schools’ accounts.

“All the requisite funds have already been released to schools. Therefore, it is expected that the support staff will continue receiving their wages.” He had told Legislators.

In total each learner in all public schools receives Sh22,244 per year under the government’s Free Day Secondary Education (FDSE) program. Of this Sh9,400 goes into operations including Personal Emoluments (Salaries and wages for BOM staff).

 TABLE SHOWING THE FDSE Structure

Other vote heads: local travel and transport, Administration, Electricity, Personnel emolument.

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STAFFING GUIDELINES FOR SCHOOLS

As the Ministry will be collecting data on schools’ BOM teachers, close scrutiny will be done to see if schools complied to the Ministry’s staffing guidelines.

According to staffing guidelines released by the Ministry,  day schools with one stream should only have a maximum of 5 workers while the largest school with 15 streams can only hire not more than 37 workers on BOM terms (See tables below). These guidelines were adapted from the Kilemi Mwiria Task-force Report of 2014.

TABLE: STAFFING GUIDELINES FOR DAY SCHOOLS

The school nurse should also double up as a matron while recruited artisans should be able to execute multiple tasks (multi-skilled).

TABLE: STAFFING GUIDELINES FOR BOARDING SCHOOLS

Schools are supposed to remunerate their staff as per the earlier guidelines (also adapted from the Kilemi Mwiria Task-force Report of 2014) and dispatched to schools. The teaching and non-teaching staffs should be employed on permanent and pensionable terms.

the lowest earning worker should pocket Sh9,660 while the highest earner should receive a monthly perk of Sh41,000. But, these salaries are to be pegged on the workers’ qualifications.

TABLE 3: MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS FOR SCHOOLS’ SUPPORT STAFF.