CBTE Must Separate Formation, Certification and National Recognition

A learner completes a mentored ministry pathway, demonstrates competence in preaching, pastoral care and governance, and receives a certificate from a Bible college. A church may regard that evidence highly. An accreditor may affirm the programme's quality. Yet a university, a national qualifications authority and another denomination may each make a different decision about the same certificate.

Confusion begins when one decision is described as though it automatically produced all the others. Ecclesial recognition is not the same as educational certification. Programme accreditation is not necessarily government recognition. Registration of a national qualification does not ordain a minister. A university does not surrender its academic authority merely because another institution has assessed valuable ministry learning.

Competence-Based Theological Education—more commonly called Competency-Based Theological Education in international literature—must say clearly who has recognised what, under which authority and for which purpose. It is distinct from Kenya's general occupational Competency-Based Education and Training, or CBET. Its credibility depends upon separating formation, certification and national recognition before reconnecting them through lawful, transparent pathways.

On 30 October 2026, the Kenya National Qualifications Authority reported on submissions it had made to the National Assembly Departmental Committee on Education on 29 October. Its memorandum concerning the Kenya National Qualifications Framework (Amendment) Bill, 2026 proposed stronger registration of qualification-awarding bodies and qualifications, clearer mandates for institutions authorised to award national qualifications, strengthened compliance…