Nairobi — Teachers are worried that information technology will render them jobless, it was claimed on Tuesday.

The Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) secretary-general, Mr Lawrence Majali, said the fear was more prevalent among older teachers than younger ones, and higher in primary schools than secondary schools.

Only a few of the 245,000 teachers were technology-savvy, making it difficult to adopt technology in schools, the unionist said.

We cannot run away from it

"There is fear of the unknown among teachers ... but we cannot run away from it and we must be aware of modern technology and use it in our daily routine," Mr Majali said while responding to Microsoft Company East and Southern Africa education programme manager Mark Matunga on fears that the implementation of the Sh24 million e-learning programme at Kenya Institute of Education (KIE) was poor.

Mr Matunga spoke at Aga Khan Academy in Mombasa.

However, Mr Majali said the programme would have succeeded if teachers were involved in the implementation.

"It would be very easy to implement the programme by bringing the union on board but they have resorted to sidelining the union," he added.

Compared to Rwanda, Mr Matunga said Kenyan teachers had a phobia for technology.

He said the digital curriculum development programme introduced seven years ago at KIE had only attracted about 20,000 teachers who have acquired basic ICT skills.

The project is a joint venture between the Ministry of Education and the United States' International Development Agency.