CS, PS beat retreat on Form 1 admissions, asks schools to regularize them

Education CS Amina Mohamed addresses a press conference at Olympic Primary School in Kibera on Monday, October 29 2019, alongside PS Belio Kipsang, shortly after overseeing exam rehearsals in the school. Over One million candidates are expected to sit for this year's national exams. [David Njaaga, Standard]

Jogoo House has changed tune on their resolve against direct admissions of Form One students asking school principals who may have done so to regularise the same with the ministry.

By the time Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang was issuing a press statement yesterday, calls for Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed to resign were growing as unions, parents, students and school heads expressed displeasure with his decisions.

Dr Kipsang’s Wednesday circular to regional coordinators of education and county directors of education was categorical that school heads who had issued letters outside National Education Management Information System (NEMIS) should “urgently recall” them.

Load the details

The CS and PS warned that any letter issued outside the system, except for sub-county and private schools, will be invalidated.

But yesterday Kipsang and Amina had mellowed.

“All principals who may have issued hardcopy letters to parents to regularise the process by uploading the students’ details onto the online system to fast tract the process of validation and approval,” he said in an appeal to school heads.

Kipsang also assured that all parents and guardians who had sought transfer of their children from the schools they were assigned by system will have their wishes considered before the end of the Form One reporting period.

He also announced that so far, 26,000 requests for transfers had been approved after school heads made the requests for validation and approval at the ministry headquarters.

The ministry’s latest statement may have come as a relief to confused parents who were agonizing on what to do tomorrow. Still, confusion reigned on some of the admission issues missing out in Kipsang’s statement.

Lucy Owino whose brother sat for KCPE at Mulwanda Primary School in Kakamega said they never got a calling letter, even though he scored 291 marks. They decided to look for a school and bought all the requirements.

“I have bought everything, and even paid Sh8000 in school for uniform as we wait for tomorrow. Now everything has fallen apart and we are back to nothing again,” she said.

Yesterday, CS Amina explained that students who did not qualify for national, county and sub-county schools were allowed to get direct admission letters from sub county schools. The sub county head teachers were then expected to load the details into the system.

She says 700,000 students are supposed to go to sub county schools.

Make a special appeal

Anna Wanjohi whose son had been admitted to an extra county girls’ school says she had to look for another school. She is at loss on whether her son will be admitted into the school, or they will be forced to make a special appeal to the ministry.

“For boys placed in girls’ schools, it is being corrected. The wrong code was entered. We are trying to correct it. There are special needs students who have been placed in schools they did not choose, we are correcting all that. Those who are ready will go on Monday, but the process will continue,” said Amina.

It was not clear why it took the ministry long to correct the anomalies, but Amina insists that all students will be admitted to school, and those who will not report on Monday will eventually be slotted into schools by the time the admission process ends on Friday.

She added that they address cases of students who may have gotten manual letters before the principals keyed the details into the system.

The ministry said they are insisting on Nemis to help hospitals identify and retrieve data of learners when using the National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF), enable ministry to track reporting and enrolling of students to allow for 100 per cent transition, and get accurate details of the number of students per school to facilitate accurate distribution of Free day Secondary Education.

The system is also meant to track transfer of students so that their details can be moved so that they are not misused in case the student naturally exits the system.

Paul Kibet, Director of Secondary Education said the process of verification before a second letter is issued is meant to ensure the student seeking transfer does not appear in another school’s list.

“If you appear in the list of another school, it means that the letter you have is invalid,” he said.

In a circular issued to regional and county coordinators of education together with school principals last month, schools were supposed to shortlist and merit students whose parents were seeking transfers.

The list was then to be keyed into Nemis for approval by the ministry. Once approved, the learner was to be moved from the selection list of first school to that of choice. The approval can only be done once and is not reversible.  

The process does not apply to sub county and private schools.

Field officers are expected to monitor Nemis and approve cases that apply in their areas.