(NAIROBI, Kenya) – A storm is brewing within Kenya’s teaching fraternity as the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) faces fierce backlash over a recruitment policy that thousands of educators are calling blatantly discriminatory and unjust. A passionate petition, signed by “Concerned Teachers of Kenya,” has been dispatched to the TSC CEO, demanding an immediate overhaul of a recruitment score sheet that values a teacher’s subject over their years of qualification and patience.
The heart of the controversy lies in the marks allocation used during the recent teacher recruitment exercises. According to the petition, the TSC score sheet massively prioritizes STEM subjects at the expense of the arts and humanities. The breakdown reveals a staggering disparity:
- Science Subjects: 65 Marks
- Technical/Creative Arts: 40 Marks
- Languages: 25 Marks
- Humanities (History, CRE, Geography): A mere 5 Marks
This system, teachers argue, has created an apartheid-like scenario in the job market. A fresh science graduate from the class of 2024 can easily score highly and secure a job immediately. In contrast, a humanities teacher who graduated with stellar grades in 2016, and who has been waiting patiently for nearly a decade, is mathematically locked out of contention by a system that assigns their expertise a value just one-tenth of that of a science graduate.
“By treating subject areas with such disparity, the Commission disregards the principle of equal opportunity,” the petition states. It paints a stark picture: a 2024 science graduate with a C+ (67 points) will always outcompete a 2016 humanities graduate with a B+ (75 points) for the same teaching position, simply because of the subject-based weighting.
In a move that has exacerbated the frustration, the petitioners claim the TSC has chosen to use the same controversial score sheet for the newly advertised vacancies, “thereby repeating the injustice and deepening the hopelessness of thousands of qualified teachers who have been awaiting for nearly a decade.”
The petitioners highlight a profound irony in the TSC’s approach. While systematically sidelining language and humanities teachers through its recruitment, Junior Secondary Schools (JSS) across the country are experiencing a critical shortage of educators in those very subjects. The petition notes that “current reports show that in many counties, science teachers are being forced to teach languages they were never trained for.”
This practice of assigning teachers to subjects outside their specialty directly undermines the government’s flagship Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC), which relies on specialized, quality instruction to succeed. The forced deployment notates the education system and does a disservice to students who deserve to be taught by experts in each field.
The concerned teachers are therefore petitioning the TSC, the Ministry of Education, and the Government of Kenya to take four urgent actions:
- Immediately review and adjust the recruitment score sheet to promote fairness and equity across all subject disciplines.
- Establish a fair quota system or special consideration for long-waiting humanities and language teachers who have been overlooked for years.
- Ensure all deployed teachers teach in their trained subject area to safeguard the quality of education and the integrity of the CBC.
- Guarantee that recruitment policies do not condemn any teacher to permanent joblessness solely based on their subject combination.
The petition concludes with a powerful statement: “Education thrives when all disciplines are valued equally. No teacher should be made to feel lesser or disposable. We demand fairness, dignity, and justice in teacher recruitment.”
This developing story raises critical questions about educational equity, workforce management, and the value placed on different fields of knowledge in Kenya. The ball is now in TSC’s court to respond to these grave concerns from the very professionals entrusted with shaping the nation’s future.
