Horace Mann
Education, then, beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of the conditions of men, the balance-wheel of the social machinery.
Aristotle
The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.
Thomas Jefferson
Bigotry is the disease of ignorance, of morbid minds; enthusiasm of the free and buoyant. Education and free discussion are the antidotes of both.
C. S. Lewis
The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles, but to irrigate deserts.
Benjamin Franklin
Genius without education is like silver in the mine.
Albert Einstein
Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school.
Oscar Wilde
Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.
Helen Keller
The highest result of education is tolerance.
Victor Hugo
He who opens a school door, closes a prison.
Jim Rohn
Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.
Henry Brooks Adams
A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.
Nelson Mandela
Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The secret in education lies in respecting the student.
Higher Education
The first step towards the introduction and development of university education in Kenya was taken in 1961 when the then Royal College, Nairobi was elevated to university college status. The College entered into a special arrangement with the University of London, which enabled it to prepare students for the degrees of the University of London. With the establishment of the University of East Africa in 1963, the Royal College became the University College, Nairobi. The other constituent colleges of the University of East Africa were Makerere in Uganda and Dar-es-Salaam in Tanzania. The University of East Africa continued operating until 1970 when the University College of Nairobi attained university status.
Apart from the establishment of Kenyatta College as a constituent college of the University of Nairobi in 1970, the latter remained the only university in the country until the mid-eighties. Since then there has been a tremendous expansion in universities, in response to the high demand for university education in Kenya. The country now has four public universities, with the most recently established universities giving greater emphasis to technology and science-oriented degree programs. In addition to the four public universities there are ten private universities in the country offering a range of degree programs. They are supervised and controlled by the Commission for Higher Education.
I. Brief Description of the Higher Education System in Kenya Following its independence from Great Britain in 1963, Kenya was a multiparty democracy, though one political party, the Kenya African National Union (KANU) was dominant. In 1982, the country became a de jure one party state until the reinstatement of multi party rule in 1992. Even after 1992, none of the opposition parties were regarded as viable threats to the ruling party until the victory of the Rainbow Coalition’s presidential candidate Mwai Kibaki in 2003.Following an outbreak of violence over the results of a much contested Presidential campaign in late 2007, a coalition government was formed in early 2008. Since then, President Kibaki and the Party of National Unity (PNU) have been sharing power with Prime Minister Raila Odinga and the Orange Democratic Party (ODM). The total population of Kenya is approximately 37.3 million (2007). World Bank data indicates that the GNI and GNI Per Capita and GDP of the country stand at $27 billion and $66 respectively. The data further indicates an annual GDP growth rate of 3.8 percent (2007), though this dropped below 2 percent in 2008 in response to the global economic crisis (World Bank, 2009). Representing a significant share of central government expenditure - for example, it accounted for almost 30 percent of total government expenditure and 6.2 percent of the country’s GDP in 2007/08 - education is historically among the most important sectors of the government. After independence, the educational system in Kenya was structured after the British 7-4-2-3 model, with seven years of primary schooling, four years of secondary education and two years of advanced secondary education to be eligible for the 3-year university bachelor’s degree program. Since the 1980s, however, there has been a shift to the 8-4-4 model of the American system with eight years of primary schooling followed by four years of secondary education and a four-year bachelor’s degree program.
University education in Kenya began in 1963 with just 571 students enrolled in Nairobi University College (Weidman, 1995). Since then, the system has undergone considerable expansion, and as of 2009, there were a total of 7 traditional public universities and 12 newly established university colleges and over 22 private universities with varying levels of accreditation. It is estimated that the country has 122,874 university students of which approximately 80 percent are in public universities (Kenya National Bureau of Statistics 2009). Kenya also has a number of public middle level colleges that offer diplomas in certain fields including engineering, education, and computer science. A number of these institutions were among those recently elevated to university college status. Notwithstanding the expansion in the past several years, the capacity of the higher education sector in Kenya is still limited and only 3 percent of the university aged cohort are enrolled in university education. In 2007, for example, of the 82,000 students who were deemed officially qualified for university admission on the basis of their KCSE results (out of the 276,000 students who took the examination), only 10,000 were selected for government sponsorship, 10,000 entered university on a self-paying basis and 5,000 entered the private sector, leaving 57,000 qualified students unable to enter higher education. Financing Higher Education Like most African countries, higher education in Kenya was historically free, with the public purse covering both tuition and living expenses (Weidman, 1995). The rationale for free higher education was based, among other things, on the country’s desire to create highly trained
manpower that could replace the departing colonial administrators. In return, graduates were bound to work in the public sector for a minimum of three years. Economic difficulties, and the alarming increase in population, coupled with rising oil prices of 1973 (Cutter, 2001) changed this trend and resulted in the reduction of the recurrent budget allocated to higher education, and eventually the introduction of user charges. Total government expenditure on education has increased from Ksh 81 billion in 2004/05 to Ksh. 106 billion in 2008/09 (Ministry of Finance 2009). While government investment in primary and secondary education has increased dramatically in the last several years, the higher education portion of total education expenditures continues to hover near 15 percent. The tertiary education sector is being questioned internally for its limited capacity to provide access to most eligible Kenyans. Worse, this limited participation in higher education is compounded by gender, socio economic status, and regional disparities. Austerity in the public budget for higher education, coupled with the poor performance of the sector in promoting access and equity, has lead the government of Kenya to introduce a mechanism for cost-sharing and user charges in higher education.
In 1994, the government of Kenya decreased the education budget from 37 percent of its total annual recurrent budget to about 30 percent stating that it was not possible to allocate additional funding to higher education (Kiamba, 2004). This shortfall in the public budget for higher education brought about the impetus for institutions to look for alternative income generating sources, in effect, reducing their overdependence on the government budget. To this end, several
strategies for revenue diversification were adopted including:
- Establishment of units for income generation. These include training and consultancy, university press and other units such as farms and even petrol stations (Kigotho, 2000).
Institution of overhead charges: In some universities, individual professors with external research contacts must surrender 15 percent of the contract to the university.
The introduction of the Module II (parallel track) programs in 1998 (see below).
As a result of these and many other measures, the revenue coming from non-government sources has been increasing. The income generated by the module II programs at the University of Nairobi grew from 4 percent of total income in 1998-99 to 40 percent in 2007/08. Nevertheless, the revenue diversification measures being undertaken offset only a fraction of the considerable financial austerity facing public universities in Kenya today.
Cost Sharing and User Charges Cost sharing in Kenyan higher education was introduced in 1991 as a response to the ever declining state budget, which did not keep pace with high student intake when the first cohort of the 8-4-4 of students entered the university (Sanyal and Martin, 1998). Under this new policy, students and/or their parents were required to cover both modest tuition fees and contribute to the costs of maintenance. A student loan program was established to enable the needy students to access higher education institutions. At the inception of the loan scheme, admission to higher education was enough to ascertain eligibility for the loan. But spurred by high default rates, which reached 81 percent in 1987 (Economic Review, 1995), and other similar concerns, the
scheme was reorganized resulting in the establishment of the Higher Education Loan Board (HELB) in 1995. Due to the fact that there were inadequate funds for all students applying for the loan, the Higher Education Loan Board (HELB) opted to use means testing to identify and target only the needy students. HELB also targets students who are orphaned as a result of HIV/AIDS and those who come from regions that have been classified as disadvantaged. The undergraduate student loan scheme covers about three quarters of the yearly higher education costs that must be borne by government sponsored students (referred to hereafter as module I students) and their family and about 40 percent of the tuition fee for the self-sponsored students (referred to hereafter as module II students) and is available to all needy students in public and private universities. When the student loan program was introduced in 1995 students received a maximum amount of Ksh. 42,000 (US$1,423). This amount was increased in the 2005/06
financial year to Ksh. 55,000 (US$1,863) and in 2008/09 to Kshs 60,000 (US$2,032). Once HELB determines that a student should be awarded a loan, the Loans Board pays Ksh 8,000 (US$271) directly to the university towards the student’s tuition costs. The remaining loan funds are paid to the student through his/her bank account for food and lodging costs and other living expenses. Almost 30 thousand loans were awarded in 2006/07 at an annual interest rate of 4 percent. In the HELB means test, different levels of household income correspond to different loan levels. For example an applicant from a two parent household earning less than Ksh250,000,000 (US$8,470) per year is eligible for a loan of Ksh 45,000 (US$1,524), while an applicant whose parents earn between Ksh 250,000 (US$8,470) and 600,000 (US$20,325), is only eligible for a loan of Ksh 40,000 (US$1,355). The secondary school attended by the applicant is then used as a second means testing indicator to modify these amounts. If, for example, the applicant attended a high cost private school, the maximum loan to which he would be privy would be Ksh 35,000 no matter how little was earned by his/her parents. One of the reasons why the initial student loan program (University Students Loans Schemes - USLS) failed was because of its inability to recover loans. However, with the inception of HELB, loan recovery has been increasing. This increase is a result of efficient record keeping, obligating employers through the use of the law to ensure repayment and also by cultivating a culture of repayment among loan recipients (Otieno, 2004). In addition, HELB works together with the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) and the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) to recover loans by identifying loan recipients who are working in both the private and public sector and mandating them to repay funds owed (Ngolovoi, 2006). Unemployment and emigration are some of the major obstacles to loan recovery. In addition to the loans, needy students also receive bursaries. The Ministry of Education disburses about 82 million each financial year to HELB (Ngolovoi, 2006). HELB identifies needy students through means testing and awards bursaries according to each student’s level of need (Ngolovoi, 2006). Funds are paid directly to the universities towards tuition costs (Ngolovoi, 2006). The maximum amount that a student can receive in the form of bursaries is Ksh 8,000 (US$271). Students in private universities do not receive bursaries from HELB and instead apply to the Ministry of Education for funds (Ngolovoi, 2006). Students in both private and public universities can also apply for grants or bursaries from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) (Ngolovoi, 2006). The CDF was created through an Act of Parliament in 2003 to finance community-based projects with the overall goal of poverty alleviation (GoK, 2006). Needy students from various constituencies can apply for the bursaries, which account for 10 percent of the total CDF (GoK, 2006). Dual Track Tuition Policy
While very modest tuition fees were introduced in public universities in Kenya in 1991, the generated resources were insufficient given the severely limited number of students. Therefore, a dual track tuition policy was introduced in 1998 via the self-sponsored, or Module II, programs. Dual track tuition policies are characterized by a highly restricted, “merit-based” entry to free or, as in the case of Kenya, very low cost higher education, with other applicants not so admitted permitted entry on a fee-paying basis. In Kenya, the module I students pay tuition fees of Ksh 16,000 (US$542), while the module II students pay about Ksh 150,000 (US$5,081) and considerably more in some disciplines such as medicine. Students who attain the prescribed cut off point (COP) on their Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations are admitted into the regular state supported programs by the Joints Admissions Board (JAB), a non-statutory body made up of the Vice Chancellors, Deputy Vice Chancellors,
Principals and Deans of the public universities and representatives from the Ministry of Education. In principle, KCSE holders with C+ and above qualify for public university admission; however, this cut off point depends on total public university student capacity. Therefore, the JAB sets the entry cut off for government-sponsored students from year to year. If a greater proportion of the students have high passes in a particular year, the cut off will be higher and vice versa. (Marcucci, Johnstone and Ngolovoi, 2006). In the summer of 2009, the JAB announced that it would lower the entry grade and increase the number of government sponsored students to 20,000 (Buchere 2009). Module II students gain entry to universities on the basis of different criteria that vary from university to university. At the very initial stages of the module II programs, candidates had to be Form Four school leavers who met the minimum entry requirement of C+ but could not meet the entry cut off point for government sponsorship.
In an attempt to increase the number of self-sponsored students, various institutions made admission conditions more flexible and accepted students from different academic backgrounds including holders of A level certificates, Kenya Advanced Certificate of Education (KACE) from the old 7-4-2-3 system, P1 holders, diploma holders, and certificate holders from other governmentally-recognized institutions (Otieno, 2004).
Although the 1980s and 90s saw the emergence of some private institutions, the provision of university education continues to be monopolized by the public sector and the contribution of private institutions in expanding access to higher education is still minimal. As of 2009, the private sector claims less than 20 percent of the overall undergraduate enrollment. At present, private universities must meet criteria (land, resources) established by the Commission for Higher Education (CHE) in order to receive official accreditation. Every five years, they must review their programs in a self-evaluation that audited by CHE. With the exception of some institutions, such as the United States International University (USIU), most private universities in Kenya are religious. The majority of these institutions are also limited in capacity with annual admission ranging between 500 in the smallest institutions to 2000 in the largest. The curriculum of most of these institutions is also largely geared towards the arts
and commercial courses. Private institutions in Kenya depend for their revenue on the tuition fees they generate from their students. Such heavy dependence on tuition coupled with lack of alternative income sources have made these institutions expensive and thus unaffordable for most Kenyans. Although many private universities have allocated funds for work-study programs and scholarships with the aim of increasing access, only a limited number of needy students benefit from institutional financial aid. In addition, even when needy students from these institutions receive the maximum student loans from HELB, they are left with significant shortfalls that are often impossible to fill from other sources. Strathmore University, in an attempt to offer assistance to poorer students, has an interim agreement with the International Finance Corporation (the private sector arm of the World Bank), and the Commercial Bank of Africa Ltd to provide student loans for tuition fees at 12 percent interest. The CBA is managing the 280 million Ksh portfolio, Strathmore has contributed a first loss reserve fund and the IFC has provided a structure to reduce the remaining risk. Repayments are in equal monthly installments over a 12 month period enabling student to meet annual tuition costs. New products are being developed that will include loans with repayments deferred until borrower finds a job. Strathmore also offers students who were rejected by the CBA, the opportunity to spread their tuition payments out over 12 months at 18 percent interest.
Secondary Education
Secondary school education usually starts it fourteen years of age and, after the introduction of the 8 4-4 system of education which replaced the 7-4-2-3 system, runs for four years. The current secondary education program is geared towards meeting the needs of both the students that terror ate their education after secondary school and those that proceed for higher education. In this context, the new secondary school curriculum lays greater emphasis on job-oriented courses, such as business and technical education. There are two care genes of secondary schools in Kenya, namely public and private schools. The public secondary schools are funded by the Government or communities and are managed through a Board of Governors and Parent Teacher Associations. The private schools, on the other hand, are established and managed by private individuals or organizations.
There has been a tremendous increase in both the number of secondary schools and in student enrollment in response to the rapidly increasing number of primary school leavers seeking entry to the secondary level. In 1963 there were only 151 secondary schools, with a total enrollment of 30,120 students. Today there are nearly 3,000 secondary schools with a total enrollment of 620,000 students. Of this total, slightly over 40 per cent are girls. The rapid expansion at the secondary level has been the result of the vigorous harambee movement that has led to the establishment of numerous community secondary schools.
Secondary school education usually starts at 14 years of age and runs for four years. Upon completion of secondary school, students can choose to go to college or pursue other vocational fields. Students who do well in secondary school are admitted to college, and others join teacher training institutions, technical training schools, or the job market. The competition for admission to college and the training institutes is very high.
The secondary education program is geared towards meeting the needs of both the students who terminate their education after secondary school and those who proceed to higher education. In this context, the secondary school curriculum emphasizes job-oriented courses, such as business and technical education. The objectives of the secondary school education are to prepare students to make a positive contribution to the development of society, and to acquire attitudes of national patriotism, self-respect, self-reliance, cooperation, adaptability, and a sense of purpose and self-discipline (Sifuna 1990). The curriculum covers six major areas: communication (English, Kiswahili and foreign languages), mathematics, science (physical and biological), humanities (geography, history, government, religious education, social education, and ethics), applied education (agriculture, industrial education, wood technology, metal technology, power mechanics, electrical technology, business education, accounts, commerce, typing and office practice, home science, clothing and textiles, food and nutrition, arts, and music), and physical education. There are two categories of secondary schools in Kenya, public and private. The public secondary schools are funded by the government or communities and are managed through a board of governors and parent-teacher associations. The private schools, on the other hand, are established and managed by private individuals or organizations, including missionaries.
There has been a tremendous increase in both the number of secondary schools and in student enrollment in response to the rapidly increasing number of primary school graduates seeking entry to the secondary level. In 1963 there were only 151 secondary schools with a total enrollment of 30,120 students. In the year 2000, the number of secondary schools had risen to nearly 3,000 with a total enrollment of 620,000 students. Of this total, slightly over 40 percent are female. The rapid expansion at the secondary level has been the result of the vigorous harambee schools movement that has led to the establishment of numerous community secondary schools. Only about 50 percent of pupils that sit for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) get places in secondary school. These are categorized into four areas—national, provincial, district, and harambee. Students sit for a minimum of eight subjects at the end of Form Four for the award of KCSE. Compulsory subjects are English, Kiswahili, and mathematics.
The secondary school curriculum was developed with the 8-4-4 system's goals of addressing the following needs: to make a more relevant curriculum that would offer practical skills applicable to a wide range of job opportunities; and to provide equitable distribution of education resources that assured opportunities for all students regardless of their origin, creed, race, or region. Though the curriculum is designed with the above goals, the post-graduation unemployment problem has not been solved. Unemployment has continued to increase and the number of educated and disillusioned workers has grown in great numbers, especially in the major cities. This is often due to the fact that schools produce graduates who have the hope that education equals access to jobs, but there are no jobs due to lack of infrastructure development. In other words, Kenya faces a problem of too many educated people without the opportunities for them to apply the skills that they acquired. There has been very little emphasis on agriculture and rural development, and many rural residents are moving to the cities. Thus, the crisis Kenya faces in the twenty-first century is finding jobs for an educated people who are poor and disillusioned. Movement from rural to urban areas has led to overcrowded cities, higher crime rates, and lower educational expectations. A study conducted by Claudia Buchmann titled "Family Structure, Parental Perceptions, and Child Labor in Kenya: What Factors Determine Who is Enrolled in School" (2000) points out that there has been very little empirical research on the effectiveness of educational initiatives that have been implemented in Kenya. Court and Ghai (1974) also note that there has been a serious failure of communication between the educational planners and the educators. The educational planners are influenced by political pressure and as a result have rushed their decisions and placed an emphasis on the development of buildings instead of education. Court and Ghai (1974) also assert that the Kenyan educational system was not developed with "designed and tested objectives in mind but just grew."
Also, while there has been a great increase in formal education, only 14 percent of the population was employed in the formal sector and 3.5 percent in the informal sector by 1990, nearly three decades after Kenya's independence. More than 80 percent of the total labor force remains in agriculture and pastoralism, with a labor force growth rate of 3.6 percent annually. The country is thus faced with intense competition for wage employment and growing pressure on developed arable land. In other words, a child's ability to find gainful employment in the future has more consequence for the entire family and not just for the individual child. For this reason school means a hope of increasing job prospects. Social security for the aging population is usually based on the future earning of the children. Kenya had implemented a social security retirement system similar to that of the Western countries but abolished it in early the 1980s when it was declared dysfunctional. Plans to re-implement the social security
system are again under consideration in the early 2000s.
Primary education is in essence the first phase of our formal education system. It usually starts at six years of age and runs for eight years. The main purpose of primary education is to prepare children to participate fully in the social, political and economic well being of the Barren. The new primary school curriculum has therefore been designed to provide a more functional and practical education to cater for the needs of children who finish their education at the primary school level and also for those who wish to continue with secondary education. Prior to independence, primary education was almost exclusively the responsibility of the communities concerned or non governmental agencies such as local church groups. Since independence the government has gradually taken over the administration of primary education from local authorities and assumed a greater share of the financial cost in line with the political commitment to provide equal educational opportunities to all through the provision of free
primary education. Almost all primary schools in the country are now in the public sector and depend on the Government for their operational expenses. The Government provides teachers and meets their salaries. It also finances a milk scheme for all students and a feeding program for students in the and nod semi-arid parts of the country. Government expenditure on school supplies and equipment are minimal as these are financed by fees levied on parents by Parent Teacher Associations. In addition responsibility for the construction and maintenance of schools and staff housing is shouldered by the parents. Indeed almost all primary schools built and equipped after independence have initially been the result of harambee or self-help efforts.
There has been a remarkable expansion in primary education, both in terms of the number of schools established and in the number of children enrolled, over the past three decades. At independence, there were 6,056 primary schools with a total enrolment t of 891,600 children. At the an a time, trained teachers numbered 92,000. In 1990 there were over 14,690 primary schools, with an enrolment of slightly over five million children and with nearly 200,000 trained teachers respectively. In addition to the expansion in the number of primary students enrolled, there has been a significant improvement in the participation of girls in education.
At independence, only about a third of enrolment in primary schools were girls. By 1990 the proportion of girls had risen to nearly 50 per cent. Educating women contributes significantly to many other desirable objectives, such as reducing the rate of population growth.
Before 1980, pre-primary education, which caters for children between one and six years of age, was exclusively the responsibility of local communities and non-governmental organizations such as churches, voluntary organizations, local authorities and individual investors. At that time there were only six pre-school training centers, which were usually manned by the Ministry of Culture and Social Services.
The Government assumed responsibility for pre-school education in 1980 and has since streamlined the pre-school program. The An training of pre-school teachers, the preparation and development of the curriculum and the preparation of teaching materials are now undertaken by the Government. The development of pre-school units and the cost of teachers services has, on the other hand, continued to be met by the communities and other non governmental agencies. To enhance the development of pre-school education, the Government in collaboration with the Van Leer Foundation, established the National Center for Early Childhood Education, based at the Kenya Institute of Education (KIE). The Center’s main responsibility is to train the trainers of pre-school teachers, who are then posted to the districts at the District Centers for Early Childhood Education (DICECE). Today, there are 18 such centers and the ultimate objective is to have a center in every district.
The pre-primary education program has grown tremendously over the past twenty years. The number of children attending pre primary units in 1990 was in the order of 800,000 while the number of pre school teachers was about 20,000.
In 1846 the Church Missionary Society established a school at Rabai near Mombasa in the Coast Province. This was the start of formal education in Kenya. That school's primary purpose was to promote evangelism but as education developed it became an instrument to produce skilled labour for the settlers' farms and clerical staff for the colonial administration. Education in the colonial period was racially stratified. There were separate schools and curricula (and much superior resources) for the Europeans. The Asian and Arab systems came next, while the African system was determined by the dominant role of the missionaries in building, managing mail supervising the few schools. The missionaries also established training colleges for teachers and provided the funds for most of the recurrent costs, with only a small subsidy from the government in the form of grants.
Up to independence there were, therefore, great disparities in educational opportunities not only between the races but also between the different regions. In the colonial period stress was placed on technical and vocational education for Africans, from the Fraser Report of 1909, which first recommended an industrial curriculum as the basis of African education, through the 1919 Education Commission Report, the 1924 Phelps-Stokes Report and the 1949 Re view Commission under Archdeacon (later Archbishop) Leonard Beecher, the objective always being to enhance their suitability as labourers and craftsmen on the settlers farms. By the time of independence the colonial educational legacy posed many problems of quantity, quality and relevance. Since that time the government and people of Kenya have manpower for a new nation. Enormous investment has been made both by the government and ordinary families. That this was justified has been made clear by many studies that show that the rates of return on educational and training expenditure in developing countries are very high. Far era and informal sector workers in Kenya with primary education are one-third more productive than workers who did not have this education.
Education transforms people and their quality of life by making them more receptive to the applications of science and technology in agriculture, industry, the services and daily life. With the achievement of independence, the new government had an onerous task not only to reorient educational policy to make it more relevant to the needs of the new nation, but also to expand the education system in order to produce the skilled and high-level manpower that was needed to facilitate initially the urgent process of the Kenyanization of the economy.
To this end, the system of education has been restructured significantly, especially since 1985 when the 8 - 4 - 4 system of formal education was introduced. The new system was intended to meet the increasing demands of the economy for technically and professionally qualified personnel. In addition, substantial expansion in education at all levels has been achieved since independence. in terms of expenditure, the proportion of the government budget that has been allocated to this sector rose from 10 per cent in 1964/65 to about 38 per cent in 1990/91. Today, more than 6 million Kenyans are enrolled in various educational institutions and adult literacy rites are estimated at about 60 percent for men and 40 per cent for women.
Well you see it is like this, first the educators themselves are not well trained or even educated to a high standard. Many teachers in Kenya have only attended teaching colleges for a short time because teaching is a low paid job and unless you are dedicated to teaching. Many are often looking around for a better paid job. Secondly, recently the Kenyan government decided to abolish tuition fees in primary schools, this was welcomed with open arms by most people, however it was double sided sword, on the one side it helped those on a limited budget to send their children to school whereas before they stayed at home.
The affect this had on the schools was enormous classroom were full to overflowing, teachers could not cope with this new influx of children into the education system. and the government had not yet trained or prepared new teachers to handle this, nor were the schools prepared for it, the classroom were too small, not enough desks or text books. Now this had a follow on effect, the standard of education in government schools started to drop. But if contributed to a new growth industry (Private education) many new private schools have since started throughout the country. These of course are only available to those who can afford them.
Nairobi Time
