Education Ministry Under Pressure on How Schools Should Punish Unruly Students

The Ministry of Education has been urged to establish clear guidelines on how schools should handle student indiscipline.

The demand was raised on Tuesday, November 3, by the National Assembly Committee on Education during ongoing consultations with stakeholders on seven proposed education reform Bills.

Join our WhatsApp Channel for the latest news updates.

The committee made the appeal while receiving submissions from the State Department for Basic Education, led by Principal Secretary John Ololtuaa.

The committee chairperson, Tinderet MP Julius Melly, questioned provisions in Clause 19 of the Basic Education Bill, 2026, arguing that although the law protected learners from certain forms of punishment, it did not adequately address how schools should deal with students involved in serious disciplinary offences, including violence against fellow learners and teachers.

"Schools are now ungovernable. Teachers are very unsafe since students can wake up and manhandle a teacher and they cannot do anything since the student is protected by the law.

"Some students are now even burning fellow students in schools. So, PS, the issue of student discipline is very important and the Ministry must develop very clear regulations," he said.

Melly maintained that the absence of clearly defined disciplinary measures had created difficulties for school administrators and teachers seeking to maintain order while complying with the law.

In response, Ololtuaa acknowledged that additional regulations were necessary to provide direction on handling disciplinary cases, including circumstances under which schools could suspend learners.

"Close 19, subsection 2 and 3 state that, a learner should not be subjected to corporal punishment, torture, or cruel inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment of any manner, whether physical or psychological.

"So, on issues of discipline the CS must be able to come up with regulations to capture all those aspects," the PS said.

The position was supported by Prof. Collins Odote, the Chairperson of the Council of Legal Education, who accompanied the Principal Secretary during the engagement.

Odote told the lawmakers that the existing framework for managing student discipline needed to be reviewed, noting that the current approach had not adequately addressed challenges facing schools.

"On the issue of discipline, there must be concession that what we have now is difficult. The current discipline mechanism is not working and there is need to do more," he stated.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education is developing a multi-agency system to improve the collection and sharing of data on student pregnancies and the perpetrators of sexual offences against learners.

Speaking on Wednesday, October 7, Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba said the ministry currently lacks a comprehensive framework and information management system capable of aggregating data on reported pregnancies among learners and those accused of being responsible.

"At present, the Ministry of Education does not have a comprehensive framework and information management system for the aggregation of data on reported pregnancies among learners and perpetrators," he said.

Ogamba said existing mechanisms for monitoring pregnancies among learners rely heavily on school heads and teachers.

"The existing mechanisms for monitoring are largely dependent on Heads of Institutions and teachers, and are not watertight," he added.

Ogamba said establishing reliable data on perpetrators would require the involvement of several government agencies responsible for disciplinary and criminal justice processes.

"Compilation of data on perpetrators also requires a comprehensive framework that involves, in addition to the Ministry of Education, other government agencies charged with discipline, in this case, the Teachers Service Commission, and the criminal justice system, including the National Police Service, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Judiciary," he further said.

Ogamba explained that a person can only be formally designated as a perpetrator after the relevant disciplinary or criminal justice process has been completed and a finding made against the suspect.

"Designation as a perpetrator necessarily implies that a disciplinary and or criminal justice process has been concluded with a finding against the suspect. In the context of ongoing reforms, we are working on a system that brings together all these agencies for purposes of sharing data," he noted.