VTCs Status Report
Since the promulgation of the new Kenyan Constitution 2010, TVET Training was decentralized and some TVET training functions devolved to the counties. The national government remained with running these TVET training Institutions; Technical Universities, National Polytechnics, Technical Institutes and Institutes of Technology all under the Directorate of TVET in the Ministry of Education.
The counties were charged with managing Vocational Training Centres (VTCs) or Village polytechnics and home craft centres as indicated in Schedule 4 of the constitution of Kenya.
TVET training in Kenya is a philosophy that is geared towards equipping trainees with practical skills and entrepreneurship skills and towards achieving the country’s aspirations under the Vision 2030 paradigm, counties are charged with running VTCs which includes hiring of trainers, provision of physical infrastructure like classrooms, offices, workshops, sanitation facilities, learning, teaching materials, tools and equipment.
VTCs in Bomet County have for long suffered and still suffering with systematic neglect and inadequate funding, and a closer look at these institutions betrays a big gap in training and skills acquisition.
On the advent of devolution there were 17 Vocational Training Centres in Bomet County which the county took over from the defunct ministry of youth affairs and it has established a further 16 VTCs. Enrollment in the VTCs since has risen from 1700 to 4,840 trainees as at November 2021. As at November 2021 there are 33 fully functional VTCs in Bomet County.
As at November 2020 there were 66 instructors, 29 principals of VTCs on permanent and pensionable terms and 81 instructors on contract(though their contract expired in 2018 but retained on payroll as essential staff) the directorate of vocational training has forwarded an intent to employ 204 instructors on permanent and pensionable terms to the public service board in 2020 but the recruitment process is yet to start.
The enrollment figures and the available staff shows an enrollment ratio of 1:40, the recommended TVET ratio is 1:10, this shows an acute shortage of instructors in Bomet VTCs, the optimum need of instructors based on the enrollment as at November 2021 is 250.
Bomet County VTCs offer a mixed curriculum offered by different examination bodies including NITA and KNEC offering Trade Tests, trade courses up to Artisan Level. Artisan Courses including the NAVCET curriculum affords the VTCs trainees a progression pathway to higher qualifications.
Socio-economical context of Bomet County VTC sector
Industrialization of the economy is the key to the socio-economic development of Bomet County and Kenya. Industrialization requires a competent and adequately qualified human resource base comprising a predominantly literate and educated population and a sufficiently large workforce with relevant skills, attitudes and values.
For Bomet County to become a newly industrialized county by the year 2030, it requires a very invigorated development of fresh skills and entrepreneurship spirit. A sound skills promotion and development programme will not only enhance employment creation for the youth but also provide investors with an abundant qualified labour force resulting in accelerated economic growth.
The county is close to the major tourist resort (Maasai Mara), host to numerous Tea Factories, host to multi-national tea companies and is looking to be part of an economic block (LREB), this offers immense employment and job creating opportunities that requires qualified personnel like tailors, mechanics, carpenters, hair dressers, welders, plumbers, food technologists, ICT experts and masons who are trained in our VTCs. This calls for prudent management of VTCs and home craft centres to serve the skills gap that exists in the community and also to spur development of cottage industry through innovations and skills development.
The VTC sector and TVET training in general is an indispensable tool in driving the industrialization and job creation aspirations of the county and country, this calls for heavy investments in the sector both in funds and human resource.
Existing policy frame work
The VTC sector in Bomet is characterized by lack of a stable coordinated institutional framework. The VTCs lack a clear policy and regulatory framework that guide planning, administration and management roles of different stakeholders.
As a result, there has been very limited financial investment, management, support and presence of the government in VTCs as compared to other sectors of education and training like ECDE, Roads and Water Infrastructure. This has been compounded by lack of clear policy that is manifested in the frequent changes of the VTCs parent ministries before devolution.
Initially the VTCs were under the Ministry of Culture and Social Services, then they were moved to the Ministry of Technical Training and Applied Technology, before moving to the Ministry of Labour and Human Resource Development.
Until recently, they were administered from the Directorate of Industrial Training, but in the provinces and districts, they were under the Department of Small and Micro Enterprises. This confusion impacted negatively on the planning, management and promotion of VTCs.
Currently the constitution of Kenya 2010 mandate the county government to take over management of this sector, there is a big and urgent need for the county government to develop policy guidelines and capacity build existing staff to effectively coordinate the sector.
All VTCs are required to be accredited by the TVET Authority (TVETA) an Authority established by the TVET Act of 2013 which has the core mandate of accrediting all TVET institutions and trainers including public and private institutions.
Major Challenges in VTC sector in Bomet County
- The County doesn’t have a clear policy on VTCs -Bomet County doesn’t yet have a policy or a bill on TVET training in its VTCs which is key component in developing development plans, there is also a minimal development plans particularly touching on VTCs in the county’s County Integrated Development Plans (CIDP). Having a county policy will guide Bomet County in developing systems in VTCs including expansion, staffing, enrolment, leadership and management, ICT integration, equipping of VTCs, quality assurance standards and others
- Inadequate, incompetent and unqualified trainers. -VTCs are grappling with an acute shortage of qualified and competent trainers for their trade courses they offer, this is brought by the fact that there are few institutions to train trainers, in Kenya there is only one technical teacher training college KTTC, furthermore qualified trainers shun our VTCs because of low remuneration and poor terms of service. This has created a situation whereby VTCs principals have resorted to hiring trainers who are not qualified. The end result is that most of these trainers are incompetent and fail to pass on the requisite skills (which they don’t have or have little of) to trainees, the net effect is that trainees come out of these institutions with little or no skills at all.
- Poor leadership and management of VTCs -any educational institution needs a strong leadership and management to guide it towards attaining its goals and delivering on its mandate, VTCs are not immune to this leadership challenges, leadership and management of VTCs include the principals and Boards of Management. Strides on mitigating this have already been made, and through a cabinet memo, guidelines for nomination of BOMs VTCs was made, subsequently Bomet VTCs BOGs have been inaugurated. There still exists a challenge on recruitment of VTCs Principals due to lack of a clear guideline on recruitment of VTCs principals by County Public Service Board, the net effect has been inexperienced persons have been recruited to serve as principals in our VTCs, there should be a policy that aims at correcting this by proposing a qualifications framework for staff in Bomet County VTCs
- Negative attitude by the communities– VTCs are currently perceived by communities in a negative way, some consider them “Schools for academic failures”, institutions only meant to train those students who didn’t perform well in the formal curricula, this has led to communities to shun this institutions and send their children to other TVET institutions, the net effect has been low enrolment that has even let some of VTCs to shut down due to low enrollment.
- Low enrolment and fees arrears-VTCs are grappling with low enrolment brought about by a collective of factors including negative attitude by communities as expounded above, high poverty levels, poor training, run down infrastructure, this has led to problems for centre principals in acquiring resources, equipment, books due to lack of finances raised from school fees. Even in VTCs with sizable number of students, collection of fees is a problem, this can be attributed failed management systems and high poverty levels
- Trainer and student absenteeism-Due to the problem of poor leadership in VTCs as stated above and incompetent trainers, lack of proper quality assurance mechanism and audits, there is a high occurrence of trainer absenteeism, which sometimes may be contributed to low morale and low remuneration and terms of service. There is a situation whereby students don’t go to centres because they don’t know if there is teacher, and equally teachers don’t go to school because they are not sure if they will find students (low enrolment and high dropout rates), it’s a sad situation where everyone comes to school “when they feel like”.
- Lack of physical infrastructure -VTCs has suffered systematic neglect since the colonial period, most building existing in VTCs are old and derelict, now that they have been decentralized and given to the counties to manage them, erstwhile this could be a good thing because of prospects of funding, this has not been forthcoming maybe due to budgetary constraints or a continuation of the blatant neglect this institutions have endured for long. If not for the advent of CDF and community participation most of this institution would have closed down. The net effect is that most of these institutions lack physical facilities and infrastructure like water, electricity, workshops, classrooms, sanitation facilities and offices.
- Inadequate or no workshops and equipment. – The main purpose of VTCs is to provide hands practical skills to trainees, but this has not been possible because they lack workshops, adequate tools and equipment. So, most of these institutions churn out graduates with no practical skills to speak off.
- Lack of marketing for VTCs-Like every business with clients VTCs need to market their courses to their prospective clients, but this is not being done by our centres, you will be surprised to know that a prospective student who is a neighbor to a VTC doesn’t know the courses the centre is offering or even the qualifications needed for such courses.
- Irrelevant courses not meeting the market, community and industry needs and outdated curriculum and syllabus-The VTC curriculum is out dated and its syllabus developed ages ago before even the establishment of Kenya’s Vision 2030, it’s a theory-based curriculum with no competency-based evaluation to speak off. Most courses being offered by our VTCs are not in touch with the skills needs of their immediate communities, our VTCs train on skills not needed in the market or which their trainees can’t get jobs or self-employ themselves.
- Non-existent ICT use and internet connectivity-The world is now a digital village, use of technology is now taking all spheres of our lives including teaching and learning. Most of our VTCs lack the basic ICT infrastructure safe for the few computers in offices and ICT labs, in fact almost all of them don’t have access to internet which is now a leading source of learning tools and aids including books, videos and slides. Our VTCs are increasingly becoming derelicts of the long past by failing to adopt ICT no wonder they are so seen like that by the communities around them.
- Lack of employment of VTCs graduates – most of VTCs graduates transition out with little or no skills at all, this means that they cannot get formal jobs because prospective employers know so. One other important thing is that this trainees come out of this institutions with little or no soft skills, employability skills, entrepreneurship skills, communication skills are not taught in our VTCs, so it’s not really a surprise that graduates don’t get formal employment, this has further made worse the problem of negative attitude VTCs get from the communities around them leading to low enrolment.
- Poverty makes it difficult for most residents in the county to pay for fees in our VTCs. The result is that most prospective trainees do not acquire the requisite skills for the work place.
- Relatively, industry is offering few direct employment opportunities for VTC graduates due to a mismatch between training offered and the actual skills demands of industry.
2 Comments
An in-depth analysis on this white elephant. The county boss and relevant stakeholders should act with speed to come up with policies that can metigate this crisis and implement the same without hesitation.
Our hope too, Bomet VTCs have been neglected for far too long. The County Assembly too should consider increasing funding to the VTC sector just like they did in ECDE sector. This VTCs are resilient and can offer much more if they receive the neccessary support financially, regulatory and importantly the political goodwill.