Silent Transition: Data of Form Four Leavers Not Available, Says KUCCPS
The education system in Kenya faces significant challenges in tracking the transition of students from secondary school to tertiary-level training.
While the government possesses data on students placed in universities and mid-level colleges, there remains a substantial information gap regarding the destination of hundreds of thousands of students after completing their Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations.
Moreover, there is a lack of mechanisms to monitor the progress of students who enroll in various institutions and determine if they complete their studies or drop out.
Currently, there is no centralized data bank that accounts for the transition of more than half of the candidates who sit for the KCSE examination but are not placed by the Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Service (KUCCPS).
This absence of data makes it challenging to track where these students go and evaluate the effectiveness of the education system.
Agnes Mercy Wahome, the CEO of KUCCPS, acknowledges this trend, revealing that they only have data for approximately one-third of KCSE candidates.
The lack of centralized data also hampers the formulation of effective post-secondary education policies and inhibits the identification of students who study abroad or join private colleges.
To address these issues, KUCCPS seeks an amendment to the Universities Act (2012) to remove the clause that mandates the agency to exclusively coordinate the placement of government-sponsored students.
This proposed amendment aims to make the placement process more inclusive by incorporating a wider range of post-secondary institutions.
KUCCPS plays a crucial role in placing students across various levels of post-secondary education and training, including artisan, craft, diploma, and degree programs.
Another concern raised by stakeholders is the low number of students qualifying for university admission in Kenya.
Out of the 869,782 candidates who sat for the KCSE last year, only 173,127 attained the minimum entry grade of C+.
Geoffrey Monari, the CEO of the Universities Fund, emphasizes the need to review the curriculum and assessment methods to increase the number of students trained at degree and diploma levels.
By exploring the reasons behind the low admission rates, Kenya can develop strategies to provide more degrees and diplomas to meet domestic and global demand for skilled professionals.
The education system in Kenya also faces challenges in ensuring the completion of secondary education.
Data from the Ministry of Education reveals that a significant number of students fail to join secondary schools or drop out due to various reasons, including teenage pregnancies, financial constraints, and deaths.
The completion rate for lower secondary (Form 1 and 2) stands at 87.6%, while only 47.7% of students make it to Form 4.
The government has set targets to improve these figures to 57% in 2025 and 64.5% in 2030, highlighting the need for concerted efforts to enhance secondary school completion rates.
Silent Transition: Data of Form Four Leavers Not Available, Says KUCCPS