Investing in public day schools will remove need for boarding ones

Kenya Red cross personnel assist the parents who were overwhelmed after following a fire incident at Nyeri County's Hillside Endarasha Academy leaving 19 pupils dead. [Kibata Kihuu, Standard]

My deepest sympathy to the families of those who lost loved ones following a fire at Nyeri's Endarasha Academy. There can be no words to describe succinctly the anguish felt nor can any atone for the needless loss of lives. If anything, these deaths are a stinging indictment on the country's education system revealing years of gross neglect and underfunding of the sector.

For starters, no child should ever be separated from their parents in their inchoate years of development. These are crucial years when values are instilled in an atmosphere of family. Yet responsibility, in these formative years, is ceded to institutions that are mostly cold, insensitive and uncaring and that more often than not, are poor substitutes for parental warmth and affection.