Laptops in 18 months

Since the Jubilee administration took over office,the school children of Kenya have been anxiously waiting for laptops that were promised during its campaign period back in 2013. This will come as a relief to children who have been waiting upto date for the promises to be a reality.

The government has hence formed an inter-ministerial team tasked with ensuring the delivery of the school laptop project in the next 18 months.

The committee comprises principal secretaries of the ministries of Education, Industrialisation and Enterprise Development, Energy and Petroleum, the National Treasury and the office of the Attorney-General.

Addressing a news conference at Ministry of ICT offices in Nairobi, Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i said members of the team will be working on the project throughout. There will also be a technical committee that will be chaired by the ICT Authority in which technical heads from the implementing agencies will sit.

Also on the technical team will be key stakeholders such as the Teachers Service Commission, the Kenya National Union of Teachers and the Kenya Primary School Head Teachers Association.

“Each of the members of the secretariat will be relieved from their current attachment for 18 months, to fully focus on nothing else but the implementation of this project; they are all public servants” said Dr Matiangi.

He was flanked by Industrialisation CS Adan Mohamed, Education CS Jacob Kaimenyi, Secretary of Delivery in the office of the President Nzioka Waita and Attorney-General Githu Muigai.

Dr Matiang’i said that through the curriculum developer, the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development, Kenyan innovators and creators interested in developing and contributing towards the development of content to be used in the laptop project will be allowed to participate.

“We are also working with Kenyan institutions on several consortiums, including those led by universities such as Kenyatta University, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology and Strathmore to make sure institutions of higher learning are part and parcel of this project,” said Dr Matiang’i.

Already, 150 master trainers have been trained and they will in turn train teachers countrywide. The Education ministry has trained 61,000 primary school teachers throughout the country, including headteachers, one teacher and a champion teacher in each school.

On power connection to schools, the Rural Electrification Authority (REA) has an aggressive plan to connect all the 22,175 public primary schools by December.

By the end of June, the REA will have connected 87 per cent of public primary schools and the rest by December.

Reference : www.nation.co.ke