Abstract:
ABSTRACT
The adoption of school based teacher recruitment (SBTR) policy in education in
Kenya has empowered school boards to employ teachers in public secondary
schools. The demand-driven teacher recruitment program which was initiated in
2001 brought to an end the supply-driven approach which had been in place since
1967. However, The SBTR policy has faced many challenges. Some of the often
cited challenges include, the tendency to favour some schools thereby
understaffing others and turnover of SBTR policy teacher beneficiaries. Therefore
there is a need to investigate the effectiveness of the school based teacher
recruitment policy as perceived by principals because they (principals) are the key
implementers of the policy in their respective schools. The study adopted expostfacto research design. Using stratified random sampling the researcher
sampled 80 principals out of the target population of 103 principals. The validity
of the instrument was assessed by experts in the Department of Curriculum and
Education management at Laikipia University to evaluate the relevance of each
item in the instrument to the objectives targeted by the study. Reliability was
tested by subjecting the instrument to a pilot study involving 3 schools
purposively selected in Laikipia County from each of schools. The instruments’
reliability coefficient as established using cronbach’s alpha was .89. Using a selfdelivered questionnaire, data were collected from 80 principals in public
secondary schools in Nyandarua County, Kenya. Nominal data was analysed
through percentages and frequencies while hypotheses were tested using t-test and
one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) at .05 alpha level. Qualitative data was
analysed for content as themes and sub-themes emerged.The study found that
SBTR policy is not generating the expected impact in high STR schools, rural
schools, smaller and large schools. The policy was generating the expected impact
in schools that had high levels of community support.The study revealed that the
recruitment practice was fairly efficient. The study recommended thatthepolicy be
reviewed from time to time to enable it to address the emerging issues. The
findings of this study generated information that may improve school based teacher recruitment policy in Kenya. It will, in addition, provoke other researchers
to carry out more studies in this critical area of teacher management in Kenya.
