KENYA: Director of CUEA Gaba Campus Propose Major Changes to API Program
As the AMECEA Pastoral Institute (API) celebrates its Golden Jubilee year, one of the remarkable progresses it has made is, incorporation by the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA) as Gaba Campus. It is therefore envisaged that, the institute is geared towards academic excellence in terms of improved programs as well as being in compliance with the regulations of the Education System in Kenya under which the institute is based.
It is upon these pretext that the Executive Director of CUEA Gaba Campus, Dr. Simon Kang’ethe, during the inauguration of the Golden Jubilee year on Saturday October 21 proposes major changes in the API Program which currently has Diploma in evangelization and Catechesis and Diploma in Pastoral Ministry and Management in addition to a Sabbatical and Renewal Program, which is basically for those who don’t want to do any academic part of the program.
According to Dr. Kang’ethe, owing to the fact that many of the participants of API Program already have their first bachelor’s degree or even second degrees, taking a diploma course seems not to go well with quite a number of them. “I have on several occasions received concerns from such students asking me why the institute insists on a diploma program rather than raising the degrees they already have.”
He explained that the institute has been thinking of getting ways to retain the diploma programs as well as upgrade to post graduate diploma, so that those who qualify for diplomas to come for the diplomas and those who qualify for post graduate diplomas to come for the post graduate diploma. Under the same program, they are also thinking of upgrading the same to bachelor’s and master’s degrees if they can be allowed to do so.
The other issue he proposed is about the time allocated for the program to cover the diplomas. He explained that, based on the Kenyan Education System, a diploma program ought to take two years. The Diploma programs at API Gaba takes nine months only meaning that the program is crashed.
“It is therefore my kind request to the Bishops and Religious Congregations sending us participants of API Program to release them for a longer period of time like a minimum of one and a half years so that the participants are able to be in class for one year and then take six months for their research and writing of their projects,” he proposed adding that in this way they will be sure that the agents they are releasing to the society will feel more enlightened as they would have undergone through a fuller program.
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By Pamela Adinda, AMECEA Online News
