Writer Alistair Cooke said that professionals are the breed of people who do the best when they don’t feel like it while Sophocles put it that success depends on effort. In fact, there is a Kiswahili saying that what glitters takes a lot of work (Ukiona vyaelea,vimeundwa).
So, work is one of the surest routes to dignity. Even the Bible is awash with work philosophy and how hunger attacks those who are lazy like bandits.
In the past four years, the government has burnt the midnight oil, even literally, to restore the sanctity of the national examinations, especially the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) papers and their primary school version KCPE after cheating cartels got inroads into the examinations systems.
These exams are now being released in record time, what the proponents say is a tactic to beat the cheats in their own game.However, teachers marking them are increasingly questioning the quality of work they deliver in prison-like environments.
Hear this teacher: “A February/March release of the KCSE examination results was unacceptable because it allowed people to buy results. But this rush [of December release] is inexplicable.
Early January release would be okay.” Last year’s KCSE exams ended late November, having run for more than three weeks; The results came out a few days to December 25. Why Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha tied the release to Christmas Day is yet to be explained.
Teachers marking the exams say the work mirrors a dog’s life where the marking personnel, teachers and the administrators, wake up at 4.30am and go to bed at 10.30pm with three meal breaks totalling three hours. So, the work takes 15 hours against the normal daily work life of eight hours.
This is how burnout sets in. And it may be what Alistair Cooke alluded to when he egged on professionals working even if they don’t feel like it. But burnout is a different thing and a threat to health. Indeed, some markers have been rushed to hospital, in what observers think is an occasion of the long hours of work to beat the deadline.
Cheats previously produced an unbelievable number of the As as mean-grade. People within the education sector say school heads had a field day bargaining for better grades at a fee.
It is believed that the release of examination results many months after marking was concluded aided doctoring of results under the guise of results moderation. That is already hurting the economy.
So, reforming KCSE marking is welcome, but it should not be at the expense of quality and health.
Losing quality is akin to cheating, if not worse.
” What markers experience goes against the labour laws. We are not just talking about these things. While marking rules require paying a closer attention to a script that is not well presented, due to exhaustion, learners whose presentation isn’t flowing definitely get a raw deal” a marker said.
It is not only in Kenya where hawks are fighting to make nonsense of examinations. In Ethiopia, last year, during national examinations, the government disabled internet to limit communication. It was a painful price, businesses said, but that is the premium they put on examination sanctity.
While the teachers marking exams in Kenya should lead a normal life at the marking centres, they are deprived of rights like going to prayer halls, getting haircuts, and having access to their phones, except during the meal breaks.
They work seven days a week and that is how ”quality is compromised,” an examiner said.
“Old examiners are withdrawing from national exam marking. Experienced examiners are withdrawing but we can’t wish experience away if we have to guarantee quality,” a tutor said, asking the Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) to come out strongly against the “unfair treatment” of the examiners.
In the last exams, teachers marking at Machakos Girls reportedly walked out on senior government officials and were ready to stop the exercise mid-way before they were promised better pay.
While the ministry scores A-Plain in its quest to restore confidence in the national examinations and any other school tests, there is a need to go further and ensure that execution is believable and is devoid of drama and unfair labour practices.
There is enough feedback from a key stakeholder –the teacher– that should jolt the entire government machinery, including the Labour and Health ministries and the national commission on human rights so that it is not only Education and Security departments that are calling the shots. Neglecting teachers marking these important examinations amounts to nothing but an E-grade execution.
