Ruto's high tolerance for failure in the education sector is a problem

A Grade 10 student prepares for admission at Moi Girls High School in Kakamega on  January 14,2026. [Benjamin Sakwa, Standard]

About a week ago barely 600,000 out of 1.13 million children had been recorded in the online admissions portal for Grade 10. This means that over 500,000 children were simply missing from the system.

Admittedly, some of these children reported to school over the last week after the government extended the admission deadline.

The latest figures show that more than 100,000 children are still missing. President William Ruto has spoken on the matter, issuing directives that are likely to be ignored. Chiefs have been mobilized to find the missing children and have them report to school.

That this caught the administration by surprise is a problem. And it is a problem that fits a pattern. The same government was surprised some time back when there were no classrooms in public schools for the “junior school” grades. The wider pattern, of course, is the utterly shambolic rollout of the competency-based curriculum (CBC) reforms.

What the numbers suggest is that we should expect a certain amount of attrition between Grades 9 and 10 (and then between grades 11 and 12 when the children join high school).

The Ministry of Education and those behind the curriculum reforms have never convincingly explained why we needed the “junior school” stage to make CBC work.

Many of us warned that this stage would unnecessarily introduce high levels of attrition into the basic education system. They could argue that it merely replaced the old system of transitioning from Class 8 to high school, but the tracking system is, in effec,t a completely different system. Only those not paying attention should be surprised that there would be high attrition.

To make matters worse, attrition disproportionately impacts those in the lower rungs of the socio-economic ladder and girls. Under the 8-4-4 system, this was clear between Class 8 and high school, and between high school and the tertiary level. We have essentially complicated this by adding a tracking system, and a placement algorithm that is far from ideal.

Again, it is unconscionable that no one at the Ministry of Education thought this through and put together contingencies to ensure that all kids report on time. Recall that 100% transition throughout the basic education system (through high school) is a stated policy of the government.

Which brings us to President William Ruto. As the head of the executive, he is understandably fighting many fires throughout the administration. However, there are certain dockets that should always be a priority concern. Not for constant reforms, but to ensure that the proverbial trains run on time. Education and health, for example, are such sectors.

You cannot have a well-ordered modern society with a shambolic education system. It is through the education system that we socialize young Kenyans into becoming members of society – both as citizens and workers.

It would be a mistake to socialize them into thinking that disorganized chaos is the Kenyan way. All this to say that the folks at the Ministry of Education are woefully underperforming, and it is time that the president cracked the whip on behalf of long-suffering Kenyans.

The writer is a professor at Georgetown University