Parents welcome planned review of CBC, say it will clear grey areas
Ithenguri Primary School pupils in Nyeri learn how to make kitchen gardens during the launch of 'School nutrition gardens' project.
What you need to know:
- The National Parents Association is on record supporting the new curriculum but said there were grey areas that needed to be addressed for its success.
- There has been an outcry from a section of stakeholders in the education sector who are pushing the new government to abolish CBC and revert to the old curriculum.
- Parents and teachers complain that the new model is burdening children and parents with a lot of homework and that it’s expensive.
Parents have welcomed President William Ruto’s move to set up an education reform task force to review the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC), terming it a timely intervention that will clear grey areas.
The National Parents Association is on record supporting the new curriculum but said there were grey areas that needed to be addressed for its success.
There has been an outcry from a section of stakeholders in the education sector who are pushing the new government to abolish CBC and revert to the old curriculum.
Parents and teachers complain that the new model is burdening children and parents with a lot of homework and that it’s expensive.
In his inauguration speech on September 13, President Ruto said a robust discussion was going on concerning CBC.
“Public participation is critical in this matter. I will establish an education reform task force in the office of the President, which will be launched in the coming weeks,” announced the President.
The parents’ club, which last week appealed to the government not to scrap CBC, welcomed the planned review, saying, it was timely in light of the implementation challenges that have been experienced.
“Though we support CBC rollout, there is an urgent need to address the teething problems at the formative stage,” said association chairman Nicholas Maiyo in Eldoret town.
‘Fry the gizzards’
“Although the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) has assured us that everything is okay, the demand on parents is huge and the task force is welcome to uncover the grey areas,” he said.
“Parents across the country complain CBC is very expensive and we want the task force to go deeper and tell us why the new model is expensive,” he added, citing a recent incident where children were asked to each bring a chicken to school.
“When they took the chicken to school, they were asked to fry the gizzards only. Shockingly, the rest of the meat was thrown away,” he said.
Mr Maiyo said there’s a big discrepancy between what KICD told parents and how CBC was being implemented in schools.
“KICD told us available resources will be used and others will be improvised, but this case illustrates how the implementation of CBC is expensive,” he said.
KICD should provide clear guidelines on how parents can assist their children to undertake their homework, he added.
“Parents have been subjected to a lot of challenges. Some of them are being inconvenienced while undertaking homework with their children late into the night,” he said.
However, Mr Maiyo remained categorical that CBC should not be scrapped, asserting the move would be “catastrophic”.
“Scrapping CBC will not augur well with the parents because we are concerned about the end product, especially now when the world is very dynamic and the new model fits in well,” he said.
