Nairobi County has embarked on a five-day sensitization campaign to educate members of the public on the importance of adult education in the 21st century.
Currently, the County has a total of 10, 841 adult learners comprising of 5, 499 females and 5,342 males learning in the 250 centres spread across Nairobi sub-counties.
Speaking during the advocacy and publicity campaign for Adult Learning and Education at Eastleigh High School in Nairobi, the Kamukunji Deputy County Commissioner James Kamau singled out informal settlements within the County as the areas with the highest population who have not attained basic education.
Mr. Kamau who urged Nairobi residents to sensitize members of the public in their areas of residence on the importance of education, stressed that the government is putting a lot of emphasis on adult education in order to eradicate poverty, illiteracy and ignorance in society.
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“We want all Kenyans to know how to read, write and to speak English and Kiswahili languages. It is only through education that one can prosper,” he said.
The DCC announced that all the 17 sub counties in Nairobi were conducting sensitization campaigns to educate the public on the importance of adult education and attaining the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education certificate.
He said it is encouraging that most people are enrolling for the adult education classes, unlike before when people were ashamed of saying that they were adult learners.
In her remarks, the Nairobi County Director Adult and Continuing Education, Ms. Salome Terah said the campaign aims at calling upon out of school youth and adults to enroll for the classes and advance their education to technical and vocational education and training, higher education institutes and other middle level colleges before change to competency based curriculum.
Ms. Terah said the classes were necessary for adults and young people who did not attend normal learning and school dropouts as it will equip them with skills to manage loans, hustler funds provided by the government and operating businesses.
She noted that currently some of the older generation receiving the 2,000 government funds were having challenges.
“The government is encouraging people who did not have a chance to learn in normal learning to grab this opportunity to transit so that they can be able to integrate into the community,” she added.
Ms. Terah at the same time called on individual’s interested in the continuing education to visit the Adult Education office at Nyayo House so that they can be referred to various centres.
She also appealed to churches, mosques, the county government and schools to provide the department with spaces for classes in their institutions.
Terah also called upon private providers in Nairobi offering adult education classes to register with the department as all providers are required to work under one umbrella.
She noted that the office was aware that some private providers were doing the work, whereas the office has no clue where they operate.
“Our mandate is to give all the providers technical advice, materials and quality data so that they can offer quality education,” she stated.
The campaign which started on Monday October 3rd to 7th this year with the theme, ‘A call to Second Chance to Learning: Transforming Literacy Learning Spaces,’ will also include road shows, talk shows in media houses, exhibitions, and reading tent and community services activities. The campaign aims to enroll hundreds of adult learners.