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Education CS George Magoha has warned principals of technical colleges opposed to recent administrative changes.
The Education ministry last week announced change of guard in over 50 technical colleges.
Rift Valley Technical Training Institute, Siaya Institute of Technology, Meru National Polytechnic, Nyandarua TTI, P.C Kinyanjui, KTTC, Kiambu IST are among those affected.
Despite the ministry terming the changes noble and a step to revamp the institutions, undertones indicate that the changes have faced resistance from a section of those affected.
“When you are reassigned and refuse to move then it now starts creating suspicion on what it is you are doing that you don’t want to move,” Magoha said.
He warned those critical about the changes against failing to honour them.
“No one is immune to change no matter how good you are, even I, was a head at the University of Nairobi and after 10 years I had to vacate,” Magoha said.
In the changes, Edwin Tarno who served as Rift Valley Technical Training Institute principal will now head the KTTC.
John Odhiambo moves from Siaya TTI to Kabete National Polytechnic while Stephen Ntarangwi who acted as deputy principal of Meru National Polytechnic has been promoted to head it.
Magoha said the changes seek to position the TVETs institution at the heart of skill development in the country.
He went on to praise some for leading by example.
“Some institutions like Nyeri National Polytechnic are doing well, in fact it is our national bench mark but others look worse than a pig sty and we are injecting in new leadership to get them to the level President Uhuru Kenyatta wants them to be,” Magoha said.
TVET Principal Secretary Julius Jwan had said that the changes will transform the institutions and fill the missing gap between training and skill development.
Jwan said the skilling sector remains neglected and underutilised.
As a result, young people run away from the government-run technical training institutions because of the uninspiring atmosphere and obsolete curriculum.
“These changes have come at a time we are working to revamp our institutions and those deployed will give that transformational leadership to turn the institutions to powerhouses,” Jwan told the Star.
The goal is to make technical courses less theoretical and more in tune with industry requirements. More emphasis will be on practical knowledge and laboratory work, he added.
The industry has often voiced concerns that the majority of new graduates from technical and vocational institutes do not possess adequate skills and have to be trained on the job.
Jwan said the institutions’ syllabi should be updated regularly to meet industry needs.
He added that the country had witnessed rapid growth in technical education in the last few years but now the focus needed to be on quality.
“Quality education is the only way to progress,” Jwan said, adding that the government was committed to providing the best teachers, infrastructure and scholarships to all students.
“If we are able to transform our TVETs then it will be easy for the institutions to produce what is needed locally rather than importing and this will propel the economy,” he said.