Government Announces New Rules For KCPE Candidates

The government has embarked on new rules for the Kenya Certificate Of Primary Education (KCPE) on a major plan to position day schools as the pillar of ambitious reforms in the basic education sector.

Children selected to join the 7,000 sub-county (secondary day) schools will now be required to enroll in nearby schools that they can easily commute to daily.

According to Education Permanent Secretary Belio Kipsang, he directed all primary school headteachers to ensure that the students who will sit for the national exam in March 2021 only chose secondary day institutions near their homes.

This will be a marked departure from the present practice where some students in day schools are enrolled in institutions far from their parents’ or guardians’ residence, posing huge transport challenges.

“Kindly advise all schools presenting candidates for KCPE that the choice of the day schools will be based on the parents/guardians area of residence.

“In order to enable the ministry to place all learners to secondary schools centrally, candidates must revise their sub-county (day school) school choices,” the PS directed in a circular dated February 11.

Kipsang said the Kenya National Examination Council (Knec) has opened a two-week window to allow schools to effect the changes. The exercise will take place from February 15 to February 26.

With the new changes, all candidates who had selected day schools further away from their homes will have to revise their choices. He directed primary school heads to ensure that during secondary school selection, they have a list of all sub-county schools.

In line with the directive, the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) gave a two-week period to facilitate the changes before the exam

“This is a departure from the past where candidates made choices from schools within sub-counties where they sat examinations.”

The over 1.1 Million candidates expected to sit the national examination will revise their choice from February 15 to February 26. The Education PS further stated that the day schools selected by the learners must be within commutable distance from their residence.