First-year university students hoping to jump ship from one faculty to another have been told to sort it out with their institutions directly, not with the Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Service (KUCCPS).
In a notice issued this week, KUCCPS made clear that interfaculty transfers fall outside its mandate entirely. Universities handle these internally.
The clarification comes after weeks of confusion, with growing numbers of freshers reaching out to the placement body hoping to switch programmes within the same university they’d already been placed in.
“Interested students should engage their respective universities as the process is initiated internally at the universities,” KUCCPS said in its response.
In practice, this means any student wanting to move from, say, a Bachelor of Commerce to a Bachelor of Business Administration, within the same institution, needs to go straight to their university’s academic office. That’s where they’ll find out what the process actually involves: paperwork, deadlines, and whatever entry requirements apply to the new course.
It’s a timely reminder, as thousands of new students are just settling into campus life.
As reality sets in for some, whether it’s a mismatch with their qualifications, a change of heart, or simply better options opening up, questions about switching courses are bound to come up.
Inter-university transfers, on the other hand, are a different story altogether. Even though the application window for those officially closed on August 14, KUCCPS says the door isn’t shut for good.
Students who missed that deadline can still apply, either this year or next. “If they sat for KCSE in 2025, they are eligible for transfer this year, 2026, and/or next year, 2027,” the agency noted.
For now, KUCCPS says it’s still working through the backlog of transfer applications already submitted. Letters will go out once processing wraps up, and they won’t be emailed or announced separately.
Students have been urged to keep checking their KUCCPS portal, since that’s the only place the outcome will be communicated.
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