CBC: The Most Expensive Education Scam Ever Sold to Kenyan Parents

A parent of three children enrolled in the CBC system shared a book-purchase receipt with me, visibly distressed. The figure on that small piece of paper told a far bigger story than the ink suggested. This was not school fees. It was not uniforms, transport, lunch, or boarding costs. It was just books. Basic textbooks. For one term.

In the parents’ WhatsApp group for the same public school, the reaction was unanimous and raw. Complaints flowed uninterrupted. Parents admitted they were overwhelmed. Some confessed they had delayed purchases. Others were borrowing.

A few had simply given up and hoped teachers would “understand.”

What made the conversation even more unsettling was that this was not a private academy or a so-called international school. This was an ordinary public institution serving ordinary Kenyan families.

This is the quiet reality of CBC. It did not arrive with sirens or warnings. It crept in slowly, wrapped in polished language about creativity, competence, and global relevance, while quietly transferring the cost of education from the state to households already suffocating under economic pressure.

The irony that hurts the most is that these books cannot be reused. They are not reference materials meant to last. They are consumables. Children write in them. Tear pages. Submit sections. Finish them and discard them.

Under 8-4-4, books were assets. They moved from older siblings to younger ones. From neighbours to neighbours. From families to communities. They were shared, preserved, and stretched across years.

CBC ended that culture completely. Every grade demands a fresh financial sacrifice. Every academic year resets the burden. There is no continuity. No relief. No memory of the past.

This is where the question becomes unavoidable. Who designed a national education system that deliberately eliminates reuse?

And more importantly, who benefits when reuse disappears?

CBC has created a permanent market. Publishers print endlessly. Approved vendors stock constantly. Printers, distributors, and curriculum contractors thrive. Parents pay without bargaining power. This is not an accident of implementation. It is a feature of design.

When learning materials are intentionally structured to expire, education stops being a public good and becomes a subscription service.

Across Kenya, similar complaints are echoing in homes and schools. Parents choosing between rent and books. Teachers are improvising lessons because learners lack the required materials. Children are being humiliated for not having the “correct” CBC workbook.

Some learners are quietly sidelined. Others are punished indirectly through silence, exclusion, or reduced attention. The system pretends to be learner-centred while structurally punishing learners for their parents’ wallets.

The government’s response has been predictable. Denial. Silence. Or carefully scripted statements about “teething problems” that have now lasted years.

What parents are asking is not radical.

They are asking whether CBC is truly about learning or about economics.

If education is a public good, why does its cost structure exclude the poor by design?

If equity was the objective, why were affordability and reuse not foundational principles?

If the state understands Kenya’s income distribution, why deploy a curriculum that assumes infinite purchasing power?

CBC assumes parents can absorb constant costs. That assumption alone disqualifies it as a public education model in a country where most households live month to month.

Parents have complained. Loudly. Persistently. It has changed nothing.

The idea of returning to 8-4-4 is no longer ideological. It is a practical survival question being whispered in kitchens and shouted in parent forums.

Sustainability is not a theory. It is lived reality. And for many families, CBC is collapsing under its own weight.