The competence-based curriculum CBC was launched in the year 2017 to replace the 8-4-4 system that had been in place for 32 years which faced criticism for demotivating students through its examination grading system and greatly disadvantaged for the workload students were subjected to. From my experience, 8-4-4 system was so rough, having dozens of assignments overnight as homework and failure to submit would subject one to thorough punishment, but we adapted unknowingly and survived through it.
The new curriculum has been introduced in phases since its launch with children who joined Grade One in 2017 experiencing its syllabus since the very first day in class. With six years in place, out of approximately 1.2 million students who were to join Junior secondary schools, two hundred thousand failed to enroll posing fear in its implementation.
Why CBC?
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CBC is said to exposure students to situations that will enable them create their own skills and knowledge necessary in the job market and life in general.
It is said to focus on the students and enables them adapt to the world’s dynamism therefore encouraging great creativity amongst themselves. They are able to create real life situations and solve them within the classroom setup.
It is pretty much a real problem solver. https://open.spotify.com/episode/2o8mankptjQ44jyvLsopFR?si=hbYUx7FGRP-geF8d6d_uxg
The Main Challenges
The new curriculum continues facing headwinds due to the failure of the ministry of education to equally consider every factor in place. https://youtu.be/zHlZt7NgFDI
As have been witnessed before, the primary knowledge drivers have complained to lack the right skills needed to train in such a system. The Kenya union of teachers reported that few primary school teachers across all 47 counties had been trained on handling the curriculum.
The second challenge is deepened by lasting under staffing of teachers in most schools across the country. Currently, teachers are understaffed at over 90,000 owing to budgetary constraints the ruling regimes have been facing over the years.
Lack of infrastructure has stood out as a major challenge. Class rooms and laboratories to facilitate the successful implementation of CBC are not enough despite the ministry of education putting enough effort to resolve this challenge. Most schools within slum areas were not highly considered as they were thought to have poor learning conditions that would not facilitate CBC. Some learners especially from remote places of north eastern part of Kenya continue to attend lessons under trees.
The curriculum has also been termed as very expensive, especially for parents with low incomes. Parents say they are always asked to buy materials for practical and classwork contrary to the “old” 8-4-4 system. Such a challenge is said to favor a few from privileged homes.
Making CBC a Reality
One of the biggest challenges in Kenya is the implementation of policies. This was also evidenced in the early years of the education system that is now being phased out.
This is partly due to the failure to involve all stakeholders in education and the private sector to enhance partnerships and collaboration.
Working together with all education stakeholders could promote innovation and research to make the education system relevant and practical in the country. This would go a long way in easing implementation of the curriculum policies while improving on partnerships where all actors would come together to exchange knowledge, experiment and scale up great ideas.
The government needs to ensure quality education without discriminating against any learner based on their social or economic background. This would be done through moderating the requirements for classwork where parents will be comfortable to provide what is needed.
The Kenya Union of Post-Primary Education Teachers (KUPPET) had also called on the government to consider increase education funding for the success of curriculum. Funding would ensure that schools get enough learning materials, teachers and facilities that would ease the implementation process.
Educating Kenyans on the need to embrace the system is also necessary as most oppose the system without background knowledge. Helping Kenyans understand the impact it would have in would go a long way in ensuring parents do not feel they are being schooled by being asked to help their children hand their homework rather it would teach them the importance of being actively involved it their children academics.
Implementation of the curriculum is still in its early stages especially for Junior secondary schools and therefore there is need to give the government time as it works tirelessly to eliminate and reduce the myriad of challenges facing the competency based curriculum.
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