KCPE exam results to be released this week

Standard Eight candidates who completed their Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) exams last month will know their results this week.

Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha is expected to announce the results for the 1,088,986 candidates either Tuesday or on Wednesday.

The ministry has been releasing the results earlier than in previous years for the past three years.

If last year’s release date is anything to go by, the results will be out Tuesday.

However, if the ministry is intent on keeping its tradition of doing better each year, the results will be announced Monday.

A senior official at the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec), who did not want to be quoted as he is not allowed to speak to the press, said Kiswahili Insha and English composition marking was completed on Thursday last week and that examiners were busy computing the data and compiling the results over the weekend.

Marking of the rest of the papers, which have multiple-choice questions, started on October 31, when the examination ended.

MARKING TECHNOLOGY

The papers were marked using the Optical Mark Recognition System, whose process entails capturing marked data from candidates’ answer sheets using specialised scanning.

“It’s a question of briefing the President today or perhaps tomorrow and that is it. All is set for the results,” said the official.

Last year’s results were released on November 19 and it’s unlikely this year’s date could go beyond Wednesday.

Prof Magoha said before the examinations began that an early release of the results is guaranteed because of the new marking technology that speeds up the tallying of marks in Insha and Composition marks, tasks that were previously done manually.

Some 6,440 examiners have been marking the examination scripts for the last two weeks in 11 marking centres.

About 20 teenage girls gave birth during the exams while many others were at various stages of pregnancy.

NO LEAKAGE

According to Prof Magoha, none of the examination papers or questions was leaked and all the candidates should comfortably expect to receive the grades that they deserve.

He said that, at the end of the national examinations on October 31, only 20 examination centres started the tests late owing to heavy rains and logistical difficulties in using police helicopters to ferry the exams.

“The number of examination malpractices has been reducing significantly over the last few years but we had challenges in Nyandarua, West Pokot and Garissa, where some teachers and exam officials tried to interfere with the tests. Action has already been taken against the culprits,” said Prof Magoha.

This year, surveillance was extended to within a limit of two kilometres of the examination centres to ensure no access to unauthorised people.

PERSONNEL

Knec engaged the services of contracted professionals, who included 1,437 deputy county commissioners, sub-county directors of education from the Ministry of Education and the Teachers Service Commission (TSC).

Also involved were 1,916 security officers, 339 sub-county examination officers, 339 TSC officials, 339 clerks and 339 data capturers in the administration of the examination.

The council also used a total of 479 containers for storage of examination materials as opposed to the 459 containers used in 2018.

The Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations were completed last Friday and the results are expected to be out around the Christmas holidays.