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"speaker_name": "Mr. Kajwang",
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"legal_name": "Gerald Otieno Kajwang",
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir. I have a lot of interest in this area because, originally, when the Ministry of Education was going round to collect views from Kenyans before putting together the Sessional Paper on our policy on education, one of our very senior politicians from southern Nyanza, who was one time the Chairman of Homa Bay County Council, when it was still a big county council--- He is not a person who went to school much. He was called Councillor Aketch Chieng'. He asked the professors who had gone to gather information: \"You are talking about 8-4-4, but where is the nursery and early childhood education?\" So, essentially, even the Ministry itself has never considered education to start before the eight years of primary school education. That is what the councillor was asking about. It embarrassed the professors because they had not thought education should start before the first year in primary school. When the policy was put together, they did not include Councillor Aketch Chieng's suggestion; that education actually starts earlier than Standard One. Even if they referred to it, they did not provide the infrastructure which would instruct kids before they join Standard One. They did not also allocate any funds to support that education. Essentially, the Ministry of Education does not consider - although they talk about it and even have officers at the district level - it as an integral part of our education system. This is because unless we put any budgetary allocation on anything, we are not considering it serious. Originally, when the county councils were well-managed, they collected taxes and provided for early childhood and primary education. But when the county councils were robbed of funding and became monuments, this early childhood education collapsed. At the moment, maybe city and town councils can do it, because they have some resources. But county councils do not have the capacity to support early childhood education. They are now left in the hands of communities. If you go to any primary school and you are taken to the nursery class, most times, it does not have a cemented floor or wall. Also, it does not have a regular trained teacher who is paid. So, essentially, the Ministry does not care about early childhood education, yet I know - and I think the Ministry knows - that any kid who goes through proper early childhood education, ends up doing very well in high school, because of the foundation that he or she gets at that level. They get to like and appreciate school. Essentially, they do very well in future. Because of that voice, early childhood education has been taken over by Community-Based Organisations (CBOs) and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), which are voluntary. There are areas which benefit from NGOs participation in early childhood education, but there are other areas which do not. In my own constituency, there is Lambwe Division in Suba District which seems to benefit from a church-based organisation, which has helped, first of all, to construct nursery classrooms. They call them Nursery \"A\" and \"B\". It has also helped to train teachers, which is a big contribution to the community. Through this Motion, I think hon. Angwenyi is asking: \"Why can this project not be taken over by the Government, so that it trains and pays teachers, and even construct classrooms?\" Since NGOs and CBOs are not found everywhere, we cannot say that they are part of our policy. We can talk of communities, but if they cannot put up or maintain eight classrooms, for example--- I have inspected the primary schools in my constituency and I know how badly off they are. They even employ teachers who are paid Kshs1,000 by the Parents and Teachers Association (PTA). So, you cannot attract any good staff with that kind of salary. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this early childhood education has also been taken over by academies, so that those who can afford take their kids to those academies which perform very well. The same children are taken to good primary schools also in academies and they perform very well. Later they join schools like Alliance High School, because they qualify for very good schools. Eventually, they study Medicine, Law and Engineering. If we are not careful, our poor 3344 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES August 22, 2007 people will never study professional courses. Consequently, we will constantly be poor. We build district schools with the little money that we get for the Constituencies Development Fund (CDF). Of course, staffing and teaching materials are sometimes poor. So, eventually, they do not get the required grades to join universities. They also do not get the money to undertake parallel courses at the university or join technical institutes. We are deliberately building a country which has two classes. I am not saying that a country should not have two classes, but we should not encourage it deliberately. I think a social system should try to reduce that gap. We must do something consciously to bring the poor into the system of the economy so that, eventually, we will also narrow the gap between the rich and poor. Right now, there are Early Childhood Development (ECD) training schools. In fact, a widow from my constituency came to see me recently and told me that she has finished training but she now has to do examinations on early childhood development, which is self-sponsored. She has to pay Kshs10,700 to sit for those examinations. She wanted the money from me but, of course, I do not have it. Why do we make it so expensive; that somebody has to train privately for ECD? Why do we not make our teacher-training colleges teach ECD as part of their training, so that when the trainees come out, we can employ them both in primary schools or in the ECD department? Why do we leave ECD to be a privately-run institution as if it is outside the education system? I think the Assistant Minister is listening and they will try to integrate ECD as part of our education system, so that we do not separate it as something very different, and leave it to churches, NGOs, CBOs and academies. Of course, those NGOs, churches and academies will still provide early childhood education, but the Government must have a policy on this; that is supported by our budget. If we do not do so, as I have said already, our children in the rural areas have no chance of ever joining the universities. I notice that the universities have reduced the minimum grade of joining universities to \"B\". This is very encouraging. I want to thank Dr. Mwiria for that, because he has been making some very relevant noises, because I think he also suffers from the same problem that we suffer from. Our children from day schools and rural areas never actually get those \"A\" and \"A-minus\" grades which we want. But have said that they have put a caution---"
}