PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: PROMOTING QUALITY EDUCATION IN LEARNING INSTITUTIONS IN KENYA THROUGH ENHANCED TEACHER CAPACITY

Lifelong learning entails that employees are facilitated with opportunities for continuous professional development in order to unlearn obsolete skills and learn new skills to help them adopt to the dynamic changes that have become global. Similarly, lifelong professional development is critical because the world today is undergoing major changes in socio-economic, political, climate, technology and shift in global markets that demand relearning in order to acquire relevant skills to cope with the changes. These dynamic changes require building teacher capacity continually to enable them offer education that is relevant to the needs of the society. In this regard, it is imperative that learning institutions embrace best practices in professional development in order to transform teachers’ teaching practices and improve student’ learning. In-service teachers for instance should be facilitated with regular and systematically structured staff development programmes to enhance their professional skills. This paper reviews literature on teacher professional development with a view to making recommendations on how learning institutions in Kenya could establish adequate structures to facilitate teachers with effective professional development with a view to empowering them to deliver holistic quality education that adequately meets the needs of today’s dynamic society. Holistic quality education is critical in impacting the economic development of the society. This in turn contributes to accelerating sustainable development.