TIGHT SQUEEZE

How over 1 million students will share Form 1 places

Admission to secondary school will push the institutions' population from 2.8m to 3.2m.

In Summary

• The Star has established all national and extra county schools will get at least 300 students in this year’s placement.

• All  8,091 candidates who scored 400 marks and above in the KCPE examination will find places in national schools.

Parents arrive with their children for Form 1 admission at Jamuhuri High School.
ADMISSION: Parents arrive with their children for Form 1 admission at Jamuhuri High School.
Image: EZEKIEL AMING'A

Students who sat the 2020 KCPE exam will next week know which secondary schools they have been admitted to. 

The Form 1 selection team began work in Naivasha on Friday under the supervision of the Education and ICT ministries. 

Since 2017, a computerised system has been used to aid the placement of the candidates to secondary school.

Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha postponed the Form 1 selection process on May 28 and pushed it to June 15.

Sources indicate that the Education ministry could release the results of the placement earlier than June 15 so parents can prepare for admission in July.

The Star has established that all national and extra county schools will get at least 300 students.

All the 8,091 candidates who scored 400 marks and above in the 2020 KCPE examination will find places in national schools. 

The selection of candidates to national and extra county schools will be on basis of merit, their school choices, and the capacity of respective schools.

Sources indicate that this year, national schools will admit 40,000 students, another 190,000 slots have been identified in extra county schools and a further 200,000 slots in county schools.

Of the over 1 million candidates who sat the exam, 243,320 got between 301 and 400 marks. They will occupy places in the extra-county and county schools.

At the subcounty schools, 680,145 slots are available. This means the day schools will carry the bulk of the admission, with more than half of the 2020 candidates expected to join them.

This will include a big share of the 586,886 candidates who scored between 201 and 300 marks and 262,307 candidates who had between 101 and 200 marks.

100 per cent transition

In May, Magoha promised every candidate will get a place in a secondary school as he announced the results at the Kenya National Examination Council headquarters.

“We are determined to work with the relevant agencies to ensure that no candidate misses a place in secondary school," Magoha said.

This will push the number of the secondary school population from the current 2.8 million to about 3.2 million.

The institutions will also be grappling with the management of the Covid-19 pandemic, which has necessitated a rethinking of spacing at learning institutions.

 

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