MPs will start probing alleged massive cheating in the 2022 KCSE exam.
A member of the Education committee said the lawmakers will investigate a raft of allegations surrounding the national exams.
This follows concerns raised by education stakeholders over ambiguous positive deviation received by certain schools.
“We will be publishing the terms of reference for the probe either on Monday or Tuesday, we will also conduct public participation,” the MP said.
The team is expected to probe the steps that were involved during administration, marking and release of final results.
The process will include an audit of the system where exams are set, compilation of questions, printing of papers and dispatch to containers
Further the transportation, conduct of principals and invigilators, submission of answer sheets to KNEC and eventually conduct of examiners during marking will also be probed.
National Assembly Education Committee chairperson Julius Melly previously told the Star that schools will be required to produce previous results of the candidates.
This includes internal assessment, mock results and even competitive external exams.
"We will also find out from the schools how their results have been in the previous internal exams like mocks so that we get to know who is cheating who," Melly told the Star.
The Tinderet MP said the legislators will have a special sitting to discuss the concerns raised.
Melly urged the public to remain calm as the committee investigates the cheating allegations.
"Actually the Education committee is going to have a sitting and do an analysis of the recently released results," Melly said.
Netizens and stakeholders questioned how Nyambaria High School rose to scoring a mean score of 10.8.
Education CS Ezekiel Machogu insists that there was no cheating.
“In the country Nyambaria did not have the highest As, it is Mangu High School. The principal at Nyambaria was formally at Maranda High and he is doing a good job,” he said.
The CS also downplayed critics who were calling for mass cancelling of the KCSE exam results, saying the threshold of evidence is not compelling.
“Mangu had 82 As, Maranda- 68, Kapsabet- 52, Kaanga- 49, Maseno 48, Kenya High 41, St Anthony Kitale 41, Alliance Girls 39, and Nairobi School 39,” he said.
He faulted former Education CS Fred Matiangi for what he termed as declining exam standards.
Despite the public celebrating that Matiang'i curbed cheating, Machogu said the situation only worsened.
"The 2016 number of As was 141 out of 571,161 representing 0.02 per cent. This was a massive failure by all standards,” he said.
In the results, Nyambaria High from Nyamira county and Cardinal Otunga from Kisii shocked giants by posting mean scores of 10.89 and 10.76, respectively.
But it was Mobamba High School also in Nyamira that raised more eyebrows after improving from a mean score of 5.1 in 2021 to 9.2 in the 2022 exam, a deviation of plus 4.1.
-Edited by SKanyara
