The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) has kicked off a nationwide effort to find and reward Kenya’s top teachers and schools with the prestigious Wajibika Award – a program aimed at boosting the education sector’s integrity, accountability, and overall excellence.
Award Honours Exceptional Teachers
In a memo from Acting CEO Evaleen Mitei to the county directors, the commission laid out the plan to give a special mention to educators and school administrators who have consistently shown a strong commitment to doing the right thing and getting results in the classroom.
The Rules for Choosing Winners
The people in charge at TSC want the selection process to be based on a solid set of performance metrics, including feedback from the Teacher Performance Appraisal and Development (TPAD) system and performance contracts, plus the results from national exams.
Teachers who have managed to get a TPAD score of 95 percent or better for six years running between 2024 and 2026 are already being considered in the running for the award – setting a pretty high bar for anyone looking to take home the prize.
Getting County Data Ready
County directors are in charge of getting together and sending over the school performance data for the identified teachers – looking specifically at their KCSE and KCPE results, especially in their strongest subjects, over the three past years, from 2023 to 2025.
Giving Schools some Credit too
Each county also needs to pick out four school heads – two from secondary and two from primary schools – who have consistently kept their scores up for at least three years in a row while also keeping any outstanding bills below 5 percent – a move that shows how important it is to be not just good at teaching, but also good at keeping the books in order.
What Separates the Great from the Good
The commission has also asked counties to identify one standout secondary school and one standout primary school that are doing a great job on governance, resource management, curriculum delivery, and looking out for the welfare of their students.
A Long Line of Great Teachers
According to early reports, hundreds of teachers in each county – 300 in total, 150 secondary and 150 primary – have already met the initial criteria, which just goes to show how many exceptional educators there are all over Kenya.
The Bigger Picture
For TSC, this is all part of a bigger effort to make sure that teaching is a respected and accountable profession in Kenya, in line with their constitutional role to oversee the education sector.
They see the Wajibika Award as a way to give teachers the recognition they deserve, to celebrate excellence, and to give everyone a clear idea of what excellence looks like in teaching.
Get it in by the Deadline
County directors need to make sure all their submissions are in by Friday, May 8, 2026, at 4pm sharp. They’ve been warned to be thorough, accurate and on time so that TSC can do a proper job of evaluating all the applications.
The Wajibika Award is a chance for Kenya’s top teachers to get the recognition they deserve – and it shows just how much TSC is committed to pushing up the standards in the teaching profession.
