Ensure progression of candidates after exam

Last year’s Form Four examination results were released Tuesday at a low-key event devoid of the previous fanfare where best-performing candidates and schools were showcased.

Information and statistics were scant, making it difficult to give a comprehensive and fair assessment of the performance.

From the outset, Education Cabinet Secretary Jacob Kaimenyi underscored his disdain for ranking, claiming that it was an impediment to the provision of quality education as it tended to drive schools to drill rather than impart knowledge to the learners.

Arguably, the debate about ranking is long and has many facets and it will take time before a plausible resolution is made. However, from what was gleaned, the number of candidates has increased, general performance has improved, and some key subjects have recorded good results.

In particular, English was cited as one subject that registered splendid performance, giving solace to educationists that all was not lost.

Conversely, mathematics and physics were badly done, yet these are critical for those seeking admission to universities and entry into science and technology-based courses.

Again, evidence has always demonstrated that maths suffers from poor teaching because teachers tend to be abstract and hardly relate the concepts to the realities of the learners.

Generally, it emerged that males continued to outperform females in the exams, although the gap seemed to be narrowing, demonstrating that the campaign towards gender equity is slowly realising the desired objective.

Also, it emerged that a few top national schools continued to register excellent performance, with some sending nearly all their candidates to the university. However, the bulk of the district and county schools lagged behind.

ALTERNATIVE CENTRES OF EXCELLENCE

Although the government has upgraded a number of county schools to national status, most of them have not shown any remarkable achievement to warrant their newly-acquired title. 

Thus, the challenge is for the government to provide adequate resources to prepare the schools to take their rightful place and ultimately become alternative centres of excellence.

The reason for elevating more schools to national status is not just in name, but to offer opportunities for more primary school leavers to benefit from the resources in these institutions. If that is not achieved, then the drive to expand national schools will become an academic exercise.

After Form Four, the candidates will be looking for progression to universities or other tertiary institutions. Statistics indicate that about a third of the candidates, 149,717 out of the 482,133 who registered for the exams, scored grades C+ and above, qualifying for university admission.

However, from past practice, just a third of those who qualified will get places in public universities which, although they have expanded phenomenally, are still unable to take in all the candidates.

Thus, the bulk of the qualifiers will have to seek admission to parallel degree programmes, join private universities, or go out of the country.

But this will only be possible for those with financial resources. The challenge, therefore, is to provide more opportunities for the qualifiers to access affordable higher education.