By Kiundu Waweru
There is something perversely captivating about education practices that are clearly at odds with the available studies.
Many children are forced to repeat a grade even though research shows this is just about the worst course of action for them. Homework continues to be assigned in ever greater quantities and students forced to attend holiday tuition despite the absence of evidence that it is helpful in most cases. Well into the August holiday, a check by The Standard found many students are going to school as usual.
While teachers and many parents favour tuition believing it will yield academic benefits, educationists say it is unhelpful and may even lead to poor performance.
Recently when one national school in Limuru declined to offer tuition, parents demanded the classes be reinstated and even wrote to the Education ministry for permission, says a teacher.
Enraged parents
Last week enraged parents called The Standard to complain they are being compelled by school head teachers to pay mandatory holiday tuition fees even though the ministry last year reiterated that it has banned the practice. "My daughter had to pay Sh3,000 for tuition which is mandatory for Standard Seven and Eight students," says a parent of a student at Nairobi’s Kasarani Junior Academy.
"When I complained, the school threatened to expel her. I stood my ground but they told me to keep my child at home. I am in a dilemma because I do want my daughter to feel disadvantaged," she says.
But the principal, Mrs Brenda Onam, says tuition is voluntary and is being offered because parents ask for it. In some schools lower class are involved. A parent at Musa Gitau Primary School says that her daughter, who is in Standard Five, is taking holiday tuition and she sees nothing wrong with it. "Parents requested the management to incorporate tuition fees into the school fees," he says.
Depending on location and status, schools charge between Sh200 and 3,000 for holiday tuition.
But most students complain of exhaustion. "I am overwhelmed but what can I do," says a KCSE candidate at Loreto Girls, Kiambu.
Defy ministry
As schools defy the Education ministry, it has not taken any action to ensure compliance.
Mr Johnson Gichinga, a University of Nairobi sociology lecturer, condemns commercial tuition and says it makes teachers lazy and encourages them not to complete the syllabus during the school term.
He blames the education system for offering too many subjects.
"A tired mind cannot understand anything. Education should be holistic that is it should develop the student spiritually, physically and should develop leadership skills, " he says.
The sociologist says to slay the tuition dragon a more flexible system is needed. "We need a system that recognises talent. This will ensure the student takes subjects related to his interest and the issue of overload and burn out will not arise."
Last year Education minister Sam Ongeri said: "Commercial tuition creates robots at the end of the educational cycle and this is not healthy. Tuition must be targeted and not turned to a profit- making business as the case has been."
The Secretary General of the National Parents Association, Musau Ndunda says tuition is addiction in Kenya. "The Education ministry has failed to enforce the ban, which has been in place since 1988."
Private tutorials
But even if the ban is implemented in schools the practice would not die anytime soon because many parents pay for private tutorials at home during the holidays.
On announcing the ban last year, Education PS Karega Mutahi said that the ministry would only allow remedial teaching aimed at assisting weak students.
Indeed educationists say a good curriculum involves special instruction designed to help weak students catch up with their classmates at all levels of school, from preschool to university. Such programmes focus on improving students’ basic skills in reading, writing and mathematics.
But holiday tuition programmes are designed to help teachers complete the syllabus.
So why continue a practice in which the cons — stress, frustration, waste of money, loss of time for other activities and a possible reduction of interest in learning — so clearly outweigh the pros?
Reasons include a lack of respect for research, children (implicit in a determination to keep them busy after school), and a reluctance to question existing practices.
Another cause is the top-down pressures to teach as much as possible to boost test scores so we can chant: "We’re number one!