The electronic bell tolls at exactly 11.20a.m. Not a student in the silent compound of Nyangwa Boys’ High School in Mbeere South Sub-County, Embu County, responds to the bell. In other schools, the sound could be followed by noisy excited students filing out of classrooms.
This too, was the case at Nyangwa. Not any more. The 1,300 students have learnt to take their tea hastily and dash back to class before the bell; they are always a minute or so ahead of the gong.
Prudent time management is one of the many transformations the school has undergone in less than five years. Just this one aspect has enabled the institution to top in academia and co-curriculum activities.
Before 2010, the school's learners were notorious for indiscipline, which resulted in poor performance.
It had reached its lowest and something needed to be done. Two teachers were interdicted for 'compromising performance.' A new principal Moshe Musyoka came in and the school was on its way to recovery.
Desperate measures were undertaken to take the school back to its former glory. One of the school's unique tradition, the unwritten rule that no student is ever sent home for lack of school fees, was restored.
“It’s unfair for a student to lose out when others are learning due to lack of school fees. We have invested in a text message system through which we remind parents to pay the fee. It’s only when we are really strained and parents fail to cooperate that we send some students home,” says Musyoka.
Being the only major school in Mbeere South constituency which also performs well in the Kenyan Certificate of Secondary Education exams, many of its bright but poor students get a lion's share in bursary allocation from the CDF, county government, Children’s Department and corporates.
To check indiscipline and falling performance, the school came up with new rules that included wake-up time of 4a.m. Of course, the students initially resisted.
“We approached the matter in a diplomatic manner by involving the student’s council and sensitising them on the importance of waking up early. They now wake up at 4am and prepare for class in just 10 minutes,” says Musyoka.
He says they complete the syllabus by end of May and afterwards sit several exams which they also thoroughly revise.
The school was position two in Embu County, 58 nationally in 2013 KCSE exams and topped in History and Government countrywide with a mean of 11.23. Musyoka, also author of two books, teaches the subject.
After the students embraced the new changes, performance took an upward swing from 6.2 points in 2009, 7.8 points (2010), 8.7 points (2011), 9.4 points (2012) and 9.13 last year.This year, their target is 10.5 point.
The principal says the students and the school community at large is committed to achieving higher grades.
Despite being in a semi-arid area characterised by scorching sun and water shortage, Nyangwa has stood out as an oasis of success against which other schools routinely visit to benchmark.
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