Junior Secondary School (JSS) educators will undergo a two-year internship period as the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) faces budgetary constraints.
A total of 20,000 JSS teachers, who commenced a one-year internship in January of this year, will have their contracts extended for an additional year. This decision was disclosed in Parliament yesterday, following revelations that the TSC did not receive funding in the 2025-2026 budget to transition these teachers to permanent and pensionable (P&P) positions.
These educators, who were recruited in November of the previous year and assigned to schools in January, had anticipated being converted to P&P status upon the expiration of their contracts in December. However, this expectation presents a significant challenge for the government, which has reduced educational funding by 62 billion shillings while attempting to allocate resources to other critical sectors.
In 2023, the government implemented a policy mandating that interns serve a two-year term across all government departments. This policy followed the TSC’s hiring of 46,000 teachers in 2022 for a one-year internship, which was subsequently extended for another year with the promise of confirmation after the completion of the two-year service.
President Ruto personally assured the JSS intern teachers of employment following their completion of the two-year contract, a commitment made in response to the teachers’ strike demanding confirmation of their positions on permanent terms.
“It is now a government practice for the intern teachers to work for two years before they are employed on permanent and pensionable terms,” Ruto said at State House.
“The JSS intern teachers will be at work in January. We had promised that before being employed on permanent and pensionable terms, they must do an internship for two years.”
The Labour and Relations Court however declared TSC internship programme illegal.
It said the teachers are not interns but fully trained and registered teachers who should get same treatment as other teachers on pnp payroll.
In the 2025 – 2026 budget TSC has been allocated a total of sh 377 billion for teachers salaries and allowances.
Treasury also allocated TSC sh 7.2 billion for intern teachers stipend and employment of another 20,000 intern teachers.
Internship is a key programme that TSC uses to address staffing gaps in schools.
The Teacher Internship Programme is a one year programme meant to equip and sustain competencies of persons entering the teaching service.
The programme targets unemployed registered teachers to be assigned to learning institutions where their teaching experience will be enhanced through mentorship, coaching and exposure to practical teaching experience.
The internship period will be for twelve months though majority of the recent intern teachers have served for two years.
Teacher internship is not a remunerative engagement. However, interns attached to Junior Secondary schools will be eligible for a monthly stipend of Kshs. 20,000/=.
The stipend will be paid subject to statutory deductions like SHIF, Housing levy, and NSSF where applicable.
On successful completion of the Internship Programme, teacher interns will be awarded a certificate.
Intern teachers are also eligible to apply whenever TSC advertises permanent and pensionable teaching vacancies.
In this years scoresheet for recruitment of teachers on permanent and pensionable terms, TSC awarded 50 marks to teachers who served on internship terms regardless of the period served.
TSC has early this month advertised 2,014 replacement slots where a total of 673 slots are for secondary schools which JSS intern teachers can apply.
TSC called for interested and qualified candidates to submit their applications online through the APPLICATION LINK not later than Monday, 19th May 2025 Midnight.