JSS intern teachers to get permanent contracts from July
A Junior Secondary School Teacher Zaituni Chepkrui (left) engages a grade class in a Social Studies lesson at the school located in Bomet Central Constituency on September 22, 2023.
About 26,000 intern teachers will be hired from July 1, 2024 after Parliament allocated Sh8.3 billion for their employment on permanent and pensionable terms.
The National Assembly’s Committee on Education has reversed the Teachers Service Commission's (TSC) plan to hire the Junior Secondary School (JSS) intern teachers from January 1, 2025.
Julius Melly, who chairs the committee, told the Budget and Appropriations Committee (BAC) that the TSC will employ the interns in July, 2024 and not January next year.
“Beginning the next financial year, the Teachers Service Commission should streamline the recruitment process to ensure that resources assigned to this function are fully utilised,” Mr Melly said in submissions to the Budget and Appropriations Commission (BAC).
Mr Melly appeared before the committee to defend the budget for the Ministry of Education for the financial year 2024/25.
“Further, the commission should convert the 26,000 interns to permanent employment beginning July 2024 and not January 2025 as proposed.”
The committee wants the TSC to within six months undertake and evaluate the staff norm requirements for all institutions of basic learning (primary, junior and senior school) to assess the optimal number of teachers required to guide future resource allocation.
Mr Melly told the BAC chaired by Kiharu MP Ndindi Nyoro that the TSC will require Sh8.3 billion for conversion of the 26,000 interns to permanent and pensionable terms from July 1, 2024.
He said the Ministry will require an additional Sh4.68 billion to recruit additional 20,000 intern teachers in the financial year 2024/25.
