CS Fred Matiang'i now turns sharp focus on exam facilitators

A big number of persons hired by the Kenya National Examination Council (Knec) during administration of national examinations may be dropped.

A Knec report on vetting of contracted professionals, recommended that all contracted staff must be vetted prior to being engaged to work for the council.

The 2015 Final Report of the Adhoc Committee of the Council on Integrity says the thousands of persons routinely engaged by the council must be thoroughly vetted to determine their integrity and suitability for work.

The report found that Knec relies on confidential information from heads of institutions in hiring contracted staff. However, these confidential reports do not contain adequate information to determine the integrity of the applicant

Early this week, Education Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i said all contracted personnel will undergo fresh vetting two months before the start of the examinations. Speaking while releasing a raft of measures on examination management, Dr Matiang’i said Knec will appoint primary school heads and principals of secondary schools managers of their centres.

“They (heads) will be assisted by carefully selected supervisors. Together with boards of management of their schools, these officials will take full responsibility and accountability for any examination malpractices reported in their centres,” he said.

This proposal was based on a finding that contracted professionals lacked details like TSC numbers, subject specialisation and national identification numbers.

The report also recommended that data capture instruments should be fully completed by all contracted professionals as a condition for continued engagement for Knec work.

Statistics from Knec show that a 191,555 contracted personnel were engaged during the 2015 KCPE and KCSE. Some 119,929 persons – supervisors, invigilators, security officers and drivers –- were engaged during administrations of KCPE alone. Some 51,717 contracted professionals were hired for KCSE. There were 8,845 supervisors, 30,334 invigilators, 10,376 security officers and 2,162 drivers.