Stop paying lip service to CBC issues with our money
A teacher supervising a CBC exam.
The Education ministry has appealed for more time to iron out the rough edges that came with the implementation of the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC), in a shift from the previous homework model where parents would’ve had to do the ironing themselves and take a picture for marking the next day.
The announcement comes barely a week after parents sustained their objection to the light manner in which the ministry was taking their heavy concerns about the CBC rollout. They’ve since asked the ministry what else it wanted them to do, after laying their lives on the CBC cross, and sharing pictures for Christ to raise the alarm.
It didn’t require parents to rise up in one accord for the government to realise the CBC curriculum has been punishing them more than a ride on Mombasa road. Kenyans might be used to pain, but even those with thick skin often need tips on how to keep their skin glowing.
Kenyans are aware the government is broke and much of the money we give them is directed to servicing debt, but if they find themselves left with loose change, we kindly ask them not to use it to pay lip service to the concerns parents are raising about the CBC.
Easy alternative
This is not the time to run to the media, say the things teachers and parents want to hear and laugh all the way to the bank having calmed their nerves and done nothing in terms of policy change.
Parents are asking you to put your money where your mouth is and stop marketing CBC, as the period for shopping for a new curriculum has already passed. The curriculum long left the supermarket shelves and found its way into our study rooms. This is the time to convince parents why they shouldn’t throw the CBC away, and go back to the market and shop for a fresh and easy alternative.
When the government introduced the CBC, they assured Kenyans they knew what they were doing, and all they needed from Kenyans was the benefit of the doubt. We have not only given them the benefit of the doubt, but we also added the benefit of our taxes and daily allowances to help them move around implementing it.
We have done enough to show goodwill, and it seems it still isn’t enough in their eyes. It’s time for them to tell us what they will need, because we can write it for them even though most of us never went to law school.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all children in Kenya are born equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among them are life, foreign debt repayment and the pursuit of reasonable CBC homework.
Assessment
If you’re going to ask a child to collect cumulonimbus clouds and present them for assessment the following day, it would only be fair for the ministry to ask local textile firms to make a blanket of clouds covering the entire country, as it’s the only way children in arid and semi-arid lands wouldn’t feel they’re being punished for not living on the windward side of life.
The Education ministry should come up with standardised assessment tools for every child under the CBC, because the stratification according to whether their parents can set up a printing firm in their homes has further alienated those who don’t have land to plant printers and power to connect to their computer comrades.
We cannot continue showing our children that where they were born matters, because those who were born on the streets will start having ideas and we won’t like it when they ban us from driving through their homes every day to work.
If CBC was meant to be a punishment to parents for working hard to make ends meet, then parents no longer need to report to the deputy principal’s office as Jesus Christ paid for all our sins when he died on the cross.
