Sossion Gives Teachers New Directive Ahead of School Reopening

UPDATE Tuesday, September 22: Education Principal Secretary (PS) Belio Kipsang wrote to the Ministry of Health requesting the vacation from schools used as quarantine facilities.”It is noted that the Covid-19 curve has been flattening, arising from this there is consensus among education stakeholders that schools will reopen earlier than anticipated.”We are requesting that these schools are vacated and fumigated by the 28th September 2020 to enable the heads of schools to prepare them for eventual opening,” read the letter in part.Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) Secretary-General Wilson Sossion on Tuesday, September 22, has directed all schools to ensure a gender desk is set up ahead of a planned reopening. Sossion urged the Ministry of Education and the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) to adopt a gender desk in schools to ensure every learner returns to school.”I am directing all schools to establish a gender desk. There must be a KNUT gender desk at every school that must be expanded to include TSC and other stakeholders,” he stated Young Kenyan girls advocate for the end of teenage pregnancy in 2018File “KNUT is calling on our members when they resume on Monday to map out and ensure all girls and boys are back in school regardless of the challenges and situations they have been exposed to.”We must work with the Ministry of Education and the Teacher’s Service Commission so that the gender issues and recovery is an activity in every school,” stated Sossion.This comes on the backdrop of the country recording an alarming number of teenage pregnancies exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic.The Nominated MP asked schools across the country to establish a gender desk with a strong committee to deal with gender issues in schools.He noted that KNUT has sufficient data and strategies to implement the gender recovery programme in schools and urged the government to adopt it as a policy.The KNUT Sec-Gen added that police will also need to be incorporated in the programme to ensure that the perpetrators are put behind bars.Sossion is confident that the programme will ensure every student returns to school despite some being victims of Gender-Based Violence and early pregancy.Teachers are expected to report back to school by latest Monday, September 28, after Education Cabinet Secretary Professor George Magoha issued the directive.The Ministry of Education is yet to announce a date for school reopening but the Covid-19 Education Response Committee earmarked Monday, October 19.  Education CS George Magoha addresses the media at Pwani University in Mombasa on Wednesday, September 9, 2020File