Kinshasa-Lukunga: More than 200 stakeholders made aware of the new teacher recruitment policy

On Wednesday, February 7, the Human Resources Directorate of the Ministry of Primary, Secondary, and Technical Education (EPST) organized an awareness-raising session in the various educational provinces of Kinshasa regarding the new merit-based recruitment system for principals and teachers in public elementary schools. Supported by the Project for Equity and Strengthening of the Education System (Perse), a project of the Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) funded by the World Bank that supports free public primary education, this awareness-raising session involved 210 participants, including members of provincial and sub-provincial committees, in the Kinshasa-Lukunga educational province. Godfrey Talabulu Tshis, supervisor of the reform regarding teacher recruitment at Perse, called on the stakeholders present at the Institut de la Gombe 1 for the occasion to take ownership of the reform and to widely disseminate it within their respective jurisdictions. “These stakeholders, who are responsible for organizing the competitive exam, will be informed that from now on, teaching staff will no longer be recruited as they were before; instead, competitive exams will be organized at the subdivision level following an established procedure that everyone must adhere to,” he stated. To explain the various stages of the recruitment process—including the preparation of a competitive exam and the teacher selection procedure—a training session for technical staff begins this Thursday, February 8, and will last for three days. “This training is for deputy provincial directors of education, chief pool inspectors, union representatives, and human resources managers at the provincial and sub-provincial levels, to explain the various tasks they must perform during the recruitment process,” he said. In Kinshasa, the same awareness-raising session took place at four other locations in each educational province, reaching a total of 790 participants: 210 in Lukunga, 195 in Funa, 165 in Tshangu, 165 in Mont-Amba, and 135 in Plateau. Willy Kambulu