The public and all the stakeholders in the education sector have been urged to support, encourage, and enrol more adult learners so as to bridge the huge illiteracy gap in the sector.
Murang’a South Adult and Continuing Education Officer Isaac Macharia has observed that literacy is a matter of dignity, and this agenda has to be advanced for a more literate, peaceful, and sustainable society.
He noted that to propagate this agenda, the government, through the Ministry of Education, has set up adult learning education centres all over the country, and societies ought to take advantage of that provision so as to be able to read, write, and communicate effectively.
“Every Kenyan must have the ability to read, write, speak, and listen so as to communicate effectively and make sense of the world,” he said, noting that “a literate person is able to participate more in development matters of a society, and therefore out-of-school youths should not shy away from enrolling for lessons so that our literacy levels can go up.”
The programs that the adult learners are taken through include basic literacy, where learners are taught how to read and write in a language of the catchment area; postliteracy; and adult and continuing education for people who dropped out of school at whatever level whereby they will be enrolled for national exams, be it KCPE or KCSE.
Murang’a County currently has 1882 adult learners, with 87 registered for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) this year.
Further, the county has 23 full-time instructors and 73 part-time instructors.
“In Murang’a south subcounty, we currently have 315 adult learners in our 19 learning centres, and 26 of these have registered for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education as private candidates,” noted Macharia.
The subcounty has also established a learning centre in Maranjau prison so as to help prisoners gain literacy skills.
In adult and continuing education, the learners also carry out income-generating activities like making detergents, making baskets, ropes, and other life skills.
Other than literacy, those enrolled in the various adult education classes get to learn income-generating skills.
International Literacy Day (ILD) is marked annually on September 8, and this year’s theme is promoting multilingual education: literacy for mutual understanding and peace.
The theme focusses on the need to harness the transformative potential of literacy for promoting mutual understanding, social cohesion, and peace.
Policymakers, practitioners, and the public are reminded of the critical importance of literacy for creating a more literate, just, peaceful, and sustainable society.
While the national celebrations shall be marked in Turkana County, the subcounty celebrations for the day will be held at Kangari Youth Polytechnic in Kigumo Constituency on September 9.
By Florence Kinyua
