EDUCATION ACT ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS PART I – PRELIMINARY, PART 1

CHAPTER 211

Section

  1. Short

EDUCATION ACT ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS PART I – PRELIMINARY

PART II – PROMOTION OF EDUCATION

  1. Minister to promote
  2. Advisory

4A.      Minister may establish institutes.

  1. Minister may entrust functions to local

PART III – MANAGEMENT OF SCHOOLS

General

  1. Management of

Primary Schools Maintained by Local Authorities

  1. Choice for primary schools now maintained by local

8      Transferred school formerly managed by church to have sponsor.

  1. School
  2. Board of

Other Schools

  1. Constitution and functions of Board of
  2. Default by Board of

PART IV – REGISTRATION OF UNAIDED SCHOOLS

  1. Register of unaided
  2. Application for
  3. Closure of unaided
  4. Regulations as to

PART V – INSPECTION AND CONTROL OF SCHOOLS

  1. Inspection of
  2. Regulations as to conduct of

PART VI – EXAMINATIONS AND DIPLOMAS

  1. Examinations and issue of certificates and
  2. No unauthorized issue of certificates or
  3. Regulations as to examinations, certificates and

PART VII – THE KENYA INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION

Section

  1. Establishment of Kenya Institute of

PART VIII – MISCELLANEOUS

  1. Area to be served by public
  2. Medical
  3. Religious instruction in public
  4. Minister may give

PART VIIIA – DISTRICT EDUCATION BOARDS

  1. Establishment of
  2. Memberships of
  3. Procedure of
  4. Functions of
  5. Financial
  6. Use of public

PART IX – FINANCIAL

  1. Regulations as to use of public
  2. General power to make
  3. Repeal of Cap.

SCHEDULES

FIRST SCHEDULE                                     –

PROVISIONS AS TO ADVISORY COUNCILS

SECOND SCHEDULE                               –

PERSONS WHO NEED NOT OBTAIN THE MINISTERS’S PRIOR WRITTEN CONSENT TO THE ISSUE OF CERTIFICATES AND DIPLOMAS

CHAPTER 211 EDUCATION ACT

[Date of assent:6th February, 1968.] [Date of commencement:4th April, 1968.]

An Act of Parliament to provide for the regulation and progressive development of education

[Act No. 5 of 1968, Act No. 11 of 1970, L.N. 41/1970, Act No. 17 of 1971, Act No. 7 of 2007.]

PART I – PRELIMINARY

1.    Short title

This Act may be cited as the Education Act.

2.    Interpretation

In this Act, except where the context otherwise requires—

“advisory council” means an advisory council established under section 4;

“assisted school” means a school, other than a maintained school, which receives financial assistance from the Ministry or assistance from the Teachers Service Commission established by the Teachers Service Commission Act (Cap. 212);

“board of governors” means a board of governors established under Part III of this Act;

“curriculum” means all the subjects taught and all the activities provided at any school, and may include the time devoted to each subject and activity;

“Institute” means the Kenya Institute of Education established by section 23(1) of this Act;

“institution of higher education” means a university or a constituent college or institution of a university;

“local authority” means a county council or a municipal council constituted under the Local Government Act (Cap. 265);

“maintained school” means a school in respect of which the Ministry or a local authority accepts general financial responsibility for maintenance;

“manager” means any person or body of persons responsible for the management and conduct of a school, and includes a Board;

“principal” includes headmaster;

“public funds” means the public funds of the Government or the public funds of a local authority;

“public school” means a school maintained or assisted out of public funds;

“pupil” means a person enrolled as a pupil or student in a school;

“qualified teacher” has the meaning for the time being assigned to it in the Teachers Service Commission (Qualifications for Registration) (Cap. 212) Regulations 1967 (L.N. 90/1965, Sub-Leg);

“register” means the register of unaided schools established under Part IV;

“school” means an institution in which not less than ten pupils receive regular instruction, or an assembly of not less than ten pupils for the purpose of receiving regular instruction, or an institution which provides regular instruction by correspondence, but does not include—

  • any institution or assembly for which a Minister other than the Minister is responsible; or
  • any institution or assembly in which the instruction is, in the opinion of the Minister, wholly or mainly of a religious character; or
  • any institution for the purpose of training persons for admission to the ordained ministry of a religious order;

“school committee” means a school committee established under section

9;

“syllabus” means a concise statement of the contents of a course of

instruction in a subject or subjects;

“the Teachers Service Commission” means the Teachers Service Commission established by section 3 of the Teachers Service Commission Act (Cap. 212);

“unaided school” means a school which is not receiving grants out of public funds.

PART II – PROMOTION OF EDUCATION

3.    Minister to promote education

  • The Minister shall promote the education of the people of Kenya and the progressive development of institutions devoted to the promotion of education, and shall secure the effective co-operation, under his general direction or control, of all public bodies concerned with education in carrying out the national policy for education.
  • For the purposes of carrying out his duties under subsection (1), the Minister may from time to time formulate a development plan for education consistent with any national plan for economic and social development of

4.    Advisory councils

  • The Minister may, by order, establish an advisory council to advise him on any matter concerning education in Kenya or in some part of Kenya, and may establish different councils for different areas or for different aspects of
  • An advisory council shall consist of not less than ten and not more than twenty persons, each appointed by the Minister, and the Minister shall appoint one of the members to be
  • The First Schedule shall apply with respect to advisory

4.    Advisory councils

  • The Minister may, by order, establish an advisory council to advise him on any matter concerning education in Kenya or in some part of Kenya, and may establish different councils for different areas or for different aspects of
  • An advisory council shall consist of not less than ten and not more than twenty persons, each appointed by the Minister, and the Minister shall appoint one of the members to be
  • The First Schedule shall apply with respect to advisory

4A. Minister may establish institutes

  • The Minister may, by order in the Gazette, establish one or more educational institutes with responsibility for the co-ordination of such activities as may be specified in the
  • An order under this section may specify—
    • that the institute to which it relates shall have corporate personality;
    • the duties, powers and functions of the institute;
    • the manner in which the institute shall be governed;
    • the constitution, duties, powers and functions of an academic board responsible to the governing body of the institute; and
    • such other matters with respect to the conduct and management of the institute, as the Minister may find it necessary or desirable to provide for.

[Act No. 7 of 2007, Sch.]

5.   Minister may entrust functions to local authority

  • Subject to this Act and to any regulations made thereunder, the Minister may, by order, entrust any of his functions with respect to education to a local authority on such terms, conditions or restrictions as he may think
  • The Minister may, by order, revoke, suspend, vary or amend an entrustment made under subsection (1).
  • Where an entrustment of a function to a local authority is revoked or suspended under subsection (2) of this section, the Minister may recover from the local authority the whole or any part of the expenditure incurred in the performance of the functions:

Provided that, where the estimates of expenditure to be incurred by the local authority in the performance of the function are subject to the approval of the Minister for the time being responsible for Local Government under Part XV of the Local Government Act (Cap. 265), such recovery shall be subject to the agreement of the Minister for the time being responsible for local government.

  • Where functions have been entrusted to a municipal council under this section, the municipal council shall appoint an education committee in accordance with section 91 of the Local Government Act (Cap. 265), and shall consider a report from the education committee before exercising any of the functions:

Provided that, notwithstanding that regulation, an education committee shall consist of ten councillors and five other members appointed by the Minister, and those five other members shall include not more than three persons to represent any sponsor or sponsors appointed by the municipal council under section 8(1) of the Act.

  • The principal education officer of a local authority shall attend all meetings of an education committee appointed under subsection (4), and shall advise the local authority on all matters concerning education in the area of the local

[L.N. 41/1970, Sch.]

PART III – MANAGEMENT OF SCHOOLS

General

6.    Management of schools

Subject to section 7—

  • every primary school maintained by a local authority shall be managed by that local authority; and
  • every maintained or assisted school other than a primary school maintained by a local authority shall be managed by a Board of Governors, or as the Minister may otherwise direct,

in accordance with this Act and any regulations made under this Act.

Primary Schools Maintained by Local Authorities

7.   Choice for primary schools how maintained by local authorities

  • The manager of every primary school maintained but not managed by a local authority before the commencement of this Act shall within six months of such commencement choose either—
    • to transfer the management of the school to that local authority, which shall thereafter manage and maintain the school (hereinafter called a transferred school); or
    • to continue to maintain the school as an unaided school.
  • [Spent].
  • Where the management of a school is transferred to a local authority under this section, the service of any teacher in the establishment of the school immediately before and immediately after the transfer shall be deemed to be continuous service for the purpose of regulation 16(1) of the Pensions Regulations (Cap. 189, Sub. ).

8.    Transferred school formerly managed by church to have sponsor

  • Where a transferred school was managed by a church, or an organization of churches, and it is the wish of the community served by the school that the religious traditions of the school should be respected, the former manager shall be appointed by the local authority to serve as the sponsor to the
  • If the former manager, or any ten citizens belonging to the community served by the school, are aggrieved by the decision of a local authority to appoint, or to refuse to appoint, or to revoke the appointment or to refuse to revoke the appointment of, the former manager as sponsor to the school, they may appeal in writing to the Minister, who shall make such inquiries as appear to him desirable or necessary, and whose decision shall be
  • Where the former manager of a transferred school has been appointed by the local authority to serve as the sponsor to the school—
    • the Teachers Service Commission, or any agent of the Teachers Service Commission responsible for the assignment of teachers to schools on behalf of the Teachers Service Commission, shall assign teachers to the school after consultation with and, so far as may be compatible with the maintenance of proper educational standards at the school and the economical use of public funds, with the agreement of the sponsor;
    • the sponsor shall have the right to use the school buildings free of charge, when the buildings are not in use for school purposes, after giving reasonable notice of his intention to do so to the headmaster of the school:

Provided that any additional expenses and the cost of making good any damage incurred during or in consequence of the sponsor using the buildings shall be defrayed by the sponsor; and

  • religious instruction shall be given at the school in conformity with a syllabus prepared or approved under regulations made under section 19 of this Act after consultation with the sponsor.
  • In determining what are the wishes of the community served by a school, the local authority or the Minister shall give due weight to the wishes of the parents of the children at the

9.    School committee

  • For every primary school maintained and managed by a local authority there shall be a school committee, established by the local authority, to advise the local authority on matters relating to the management of the
  • The members of a school committee shall be appointed by the local authority in the prescribed number and manner, and the members of the committee shall include persons to represent the local authority, the community served by the school and, where a sponsor to the school has been appointed under section 8, the