Grades Six Pupils Are Invited To Select Their Junior Secondary Schools, Here’s New Guidelines

Students in Grade Six will have the chance to choose their preferred junior secondary schools from August 15 to August 30. This will mark the beginning of the changeover to junior secondary schools, which will take place in January 2023.

This choice will be comparable to what students in class 8 do. The placement of Grade Six students in all already accredited public and private secondary schools would be offered, according to Education Cabinet Secretary Prof. George Magoha.

The Junior Secondary Schools (JSS) selection portal was launched on August 15 and will be accessible till August 30, according to the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec).

KNEC Chief Executive Officer David Njeng’ere indicated that students were free to begin choosing their chosen secondary institutions.

Learners, with the help of their school heads and teachers, are required to log into the portal, go to ‘Grade Six register’ and select their preferred schools.

The selection criterion requires learners to select two national schools, two regional schools, two county schools, four sub-county schools, and two private schools of their choice.

The criterion is the same as that used in the selection of Form One places by Standard Eight learners. There are more than 10,487 secondary schools in Kenya, of which 8,933 are public and 1,554 are private institutions.

While releasing the JSS placement guidelines, Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha said public secondary schools that share a compound with a public primary school should utilize available classrooms as additional learning space.

Students whose parents are required to pay the tuition at these privately held institutions will have access to registered private secondary schools.

The ministry has so far identified 2,300 public primary schools that house junior secondary students and are located on the same property as secondary schools.

By January of the following year, the government anticipates that private schools would build more than 5,000 junior secondary school-level classrooms.

In order to allow capable and willing parents to send their children to the schools, private school owners have also been urged to create separate JSS units.

In numerous public secondary schools, more than 7,000 junior secondary level classrooms have been constructed. By the end of the month, an additional 3,500 tasks should be finished.

“Learners, in consultation with their parents and teachers, will be given an opportunity to select a public or private secondary school of their choice for their JSS education. Parents shall meet the cost of learning in private schools as is the usual practice,” said Prof Magoha.

Since then, some privately managed primary schools have urged students to enroll there and reassured parents that they will provide the JSS curriculum.