Ministry releases next year's calendar for schools and colleges

Mercy Muthoni, language teacher at Indupa Comprehensive School reading the newspaper with students during the NIE launch.[Collins Oduor, Standard]

The Ministry of Education has released the school calendar for the next year.

In a circular dated October 9, Basic Education Principal Secretary Julius Bitok unveiled the 2026 term dates for pre-primary, primary, junior, senior, and secondary schools.

According to the circular, a 13-week first term will start from January 5 and end on April 2.

The Students will then go for a mid-term break from February 25 to March 1, followed by a three-week holiday from April 7 to 24.

The longest second term will commence on April 27 and run for 14 weeks until July 31.

A five-day half-term break will begin from June 24 to June 28.

This will be followed by a three-week August holiday from August 3 to 21st.

Thereafter, the third term will commence on August 24, covering nine weeks up to October 23.

Days after, all the National examinations, including the Kenya Primary School Education Assessment and the Kenya Intermediate Level Education Assessment, will be conducted, ending on October 29 and 30th, respectively.

The Kenya Junior School Education Assessment(KJSEA) and the Kenya Pre-Vocational Level Education Assessment(KPLEA) will also run at the same time from October 26 to November 5.

The three-week-long Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education examinations will take place from November 2 to November 20.

A long holiday will then begin on October 26 and last for 10 weeks until January 1, 2027.

For the diploma teachers' training college, a parallel calendar will run from January 6 to April 2 during the first 13 weeks of term one.

This will be followed by a three-week holiday from April 7 to 24.

Subsequently, a 13-week-long second term begins from April 27 to July 31.

The students will then have a three-week August holiday starting from the 3rd to the 21st.

Finally, the third term will begin from August 24 to November 6, followed by the December holiday, which will last from November 9 to January 1, 2027.

The Ministry has reiterated that, "Activities and visits to secondary schools in the third term 2026 remain banned as per the earlier circular.