School strikes continue to sweep right across the country.
In the last 24 hours more schools have joined the growing list of schools that have gone on strike. The latest are Pumwani, Aquinas and Lenana High school. As I was writing this post there were unconfirmed reports that two more Nairobi schools have also gone on strike this morning.
At Lenana it is reported that fourth formers are continuing with their mocks even as the rest of the school is on strike.
We at Kumekucha are doing a deep incisive piece exploring some of the possible reasons that may have caused this unprecedented crisis.
We are in for a show ... as we continue to create committees that will not be allowed to get to the roots of the issues.
ReplyDeleteSome action needs to be taken immediately. Students should be interviewed and given a chance to air their grievances so that the root causes of this national problem can be addressed once and for all. We have innocent students being burnt to death and property worth millions going up in smoke just because we have turned a deaf ear to the plight of these disillusioned students. We need action NOW.
ReplyDeleteParents are busy making money at the expense of bringing up their children. So what is the committe mandated to do and how far will they go? (it is called the Y-generation dads)
ReplyDeleteWho saw that dad that was giving his kid beer in a tusker can during one of those rugby games?...Yet you expect such parents to bring up well mannered disciplined children? I bet not. Hold your breath
Ivy
Honestly if i were in high school i would be one of those supporting the removal of mock exams for the simple reason that i hated exams ... and a believe that with the exception of 3 subjects all the others (6 of them) were a waste of my time.
ReplyDeleteBut doing exam for the 3 subjects that i loved was a 'joy' coz i just happened to understand them and i had to do a little reading. For the other 6 it was a pain coz i had to cram (something that used to distress me) last minute, for the purpose of passing the exams.
So these excuses of striking coz of not having a mobile phone or not been allowed to have more entertainment time are simply excuses. 1st we all know you go to school to read so why would a student need distractives like more entertainment time or less prep time? ... reason- the student does not want to be in class.
So we ask, why does a student not want to be in class? That, my friends, is where we should start looking for the problems. The mistake of giving the students what they demand only buries the deeper problems they are facing ... and at a later time another problem will show up.
This is a generation gap problem.... We have a number of qualified youths to spearhead any commission of sorts. They understand the dynamics and a feel to the root problems. The Old Professor and his aging-team will only come up with superficial and draconian recommendations..... It is a time to change tactics. Get the Youth involved.
ReplyDeleteKenya is a mess. When you have a loser crowned president, tribe matters most if one is to get a job, endemic corruption at KNEC with rich kids always laying their hands on exam papers well in advance, endemic corruption... why should kids stay put and study. We can't solve the 'mess' in schools until there is 'order' in the country. As things stand, why should students even think of working hard? For what future?
ReplyDeleteAnon 1.47am,
ReplyDeleteI got a feeling that the students don't really know what really ails them. Why i say so is that many of them that are in the streets are not sober. Some have gone there out of mob-psychology and the 'leaders' of the strike are most probably high on bang or alcohol.
What they will say ails them is not different from what was said in a strike that took place 10yrs ago. That is better food, less prep time, change of prefects, too many exams and no reading time, favourism, food not enough, too much school fees, etc
What is in all these issues ... lack of good leadership and management. When the students air these issues most likely they are usually ignored. But a closer look to these issues will tell you there is a deeper problem than meet the eye kind of thing.
Sayra
ReplyDeleteMocks must be done...Personally mock is used to help gauge a student's performance....We did and so they must...Next time they will tell you that they dont want to do KCSE then we will say yes.
It is not about what they like or not like, i hated mathematics but did i have a choice, i didn't i had to work hard though it still was a challenge. Students right now are allowed to go into an exam with a calcs meaning they just dont have to do those long multiplications. Trust me by giving them what they like is the reason we are in such a mess. They are even doing fewer units...
When a boy/girl can dare call his dad stupid and gets away with that, in my time that was an absolute abomination....You wouldn't dare
I want to agree with Kim Maseno partly, that students no longer have anything that motivates them to work hard, gone are the days when a campuserian was the pride of the whole village/estate. Now you finish campus and you are just there no job you are still tarmacking 10 years down the line...Woe unto you if your buddy who got a C is now working in one of the big banks.
I stand with parenting (parents are bringing up their children badly) A child refuses to take supper and she is sang for a lullaby to go and sleep...Just refusing to eat dinner was inviting the wrath of my mother and woe unto you if Thursday fikas (It used to be our discipline day)..Trust me i am not complaining though i didn't like it...I love my paros more coz they made me what i am and the discipline i got will be the yardstick for my children...I tell you woe unto them
Ivy
The problem is a deep-rooted one. CSons and daughters of rich parents know that they will get a good job anyway. Those of poor parents and without connections at the right places know that their future is quite bleak. They also have no examples to follow. They see politicians whose main goal is to grab and to cheat and what is most amazing that most of them have either never finished their studies or they did not even try to. They learned the game of life in copying others before them - like Daniel arap Moi, Biwott etc. (who have even been so clever to falsificate school and university degrees like Biwott did). So what do you expect? The school system as it is is rotten, do doubt about it - but what is more rotten is the Kenyan society, business and politics. Going on strike is not changing anything. Calling for a change in politics and politicians starting right at the top, including the President, VP, and also the useless Prime Minister and the rest of their entourage may well the be the only and last resource. The young Kenyans should go into the streets and demand their rights. They were not allowed to vote, but it is their future these old crooks are playing with. Let's see if somebody would dare to shoot them if those children and youngsters go into the streets.
ReplyDeleteToday's child is under undue pressure and is extremely stressed. As far as I know, mock exams is not the issue here. During my days, I woke up at 7.00am coz classes started at 8.00am. I left school at 3.30pm and did not attend Saturday classes. I did 5 subjects in CPE, with only three compulsory. I know things have today changed but believe you me, today's 8-4-4 child cannot still muster our reasoning capabilities. Today a kindergaten child will wake up at 4.30am or 5.00am and this goes on up to class 8 through to form one. This child will do between 8-12 subjects while in primary and stretch on to secondary. They even attend Saturday classes and evening tuitions that run to as late as 6.30 pm. Today's child have no life absolutely.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, the corrupt headmasters/mistresses now make a lot of money from parents at the expense of performance. Unchequered, teachers too try to top up their income by introducing tuition fee but use this time to complete the huge syllabus imposed by the examination council.
Thirdly, the government has allowed unnecessary competition amongst schools and individual students through their faulty grading system. This has given pressure to students who not only look for their talents and abilities but read to pass exams or measure up.For example, a bright child who has passed with 300 marks out of 500 cannot get a National or Provincial school in Nairobi and therefore considers him/herself failure. This is not so that they've failed but because of limited space. The government boasts that it has bypassed its target by annual % increase in number of children enrolled for exams but do not work on expanding the absorbtion of these children who roll out, i.e. no expansion of secondary schools for increased number of primary pupils roll-out and no expansion of public tertiary colleges for increased number of secondary students roll-out. It is no wonder that in anticipation of non-admittance to university (which enrols as per bed capacity thus reducing the intake points), an intelligent student whose CATS predicts a promising C+ or B- will go on ramphage. Why? Because why stress me all the way from 8 only to declare me a failure at the first 4 while already locking me out at the expected 4. This is not only because of your capacity but condemning me to never even know what I am able to do in life.
The buck stops with the Ministry of Education. They're adamant to change the system of grading (schools and students) because the Ministry officials, PEOs, DEOs, Board of Governors, and school heads have found that in education, you can milk a cow that is being fed by someone else's fodder.
Supu
The present unrest in schools is symptomatic of a society at crossroads. Kids learn best by imitation and whom do tehy ahve as leaders? Mock exams a necessary evil and they often serve their intended purpose. But these kids know that their fate is sealed in failure no matter their efforts.
ReplyDeleteLeaves you wondering whether there is a corrletion with last years KCSE top ups. In these kids' minds the results will be decided elsewhere and so why stress them anyway? We are good at formulating theories and commissions to firefight while the real inferno is left to smoulder.
Parenting has no sustainable substitute. When parents run like headless chicken to measure to societal expetations-more money and degrees, kids are left to their own devices and hence the meyhem. Add that to the corrupt culture with drug barons gracing bunge and their surrogates being who-is-who in Kenya and you get the ogre standing infront of our future. Simply put we have no leaders capable of making seasoned and hard decisions. Al we have are chaps beholden exclusively to wealth accumulatio and tribal loyalties.
Ivy,
ReplyDeleteI dont share the thought that mocks must be done coz we did them. To me they come across as a means to pressurize the students to perform, and at the end of it they give a student a false impression that they are ready (or not ready) for exams at the wrong time. If the mock exams came from national examining body that is another thing, but they are very different and come from the district level.
Trying to create into the student that if they dont score good grades in school that that is the end of life is the worst up-bringing one can have ... in a way that should tell us why many lose hope when they dont get As or Bs. That means the grading system is faulty. A system that worked like 50yrs ago and we are still forcing it to work now is a classic example of putting new wine in an old wineskin.
Learning is a process that requires alot of patience and motivation. And there is nothing as dicouraging as been told you will make it in life when you get good scores and after campus you are worse than that person who never saw the door of a high school. We should wake up to the fact that been in school (especially in the kenyan system where we concentrate on theory and no practicals) is a good thing but that is like 20% of what you should do as an individual to lead a better life.
When we fix Kenya, students will stop striking. Were there any strikes in 2003 and 2004?
ReplyDeleteBlame it on our yobbish culture. Like somebody put it here, violence begets violence.
ReplyDeleteThey are just emulating what ODM yobs did after the disputed elections. Its looks like violence is the only way of getting our point across. Next it will be patients ransacking hospitals.
Mungu tusaidie!
Our schools are only as good as our country, and vice versa.
ReplyDeleteExams- I wish there was a way of getting pupils' grades average from the day they enter primo or seco till the day they leave. Like we have in the colleges-except Uon? I heard they were free to roam during the first or even second year?
Generally speaking, Kenyan kids are very industrious at school coz paros keep drilling it in your head that education is the only way you are 'making it'. Little can be more frustrating than toiling for 8 and/or 4 years only to see your 'making it' jeopardized by poor exam performance in the course of three days (KCPE) or a couple weeks (KCSE).
Halafu there is this thing where exams-in my opinion-are written to fail as many students as possible. Yaani instead of putting up more educational facilities, we fail the kids so only 30% of the 30% who 'pass' the exams gain admittance into public universities. Where I went to school it was a pity that they couldn't admit more students, reason being that there were not enough halls of residence to accommodate everyone. Somebody should have (been allowed to?) build property in the area ....
We are working with systems that we inherited from our colonial masters. No one cares to even think that all were put in place to deter as many Kenyan Africans to get education as possible. There were exams every couple years to weed out the less 'intelligent ones'. We need to design a school system that caters to and serves our needs.
Sayra
ReplyDeleteWhat i meant is that MOCKS can never be an excuse....We did mocks, we were under pressure but we never threw stones or burn the dorms...That is crap or the most stupid idea i have heard in a long time. MOCKS have always been there and they will not stop coz some students walitupa mawe.
So the next time they will tell you what hata KCSE is bad...Watch the space
PKW i think all the Uni's including UoN start grading in 2nd year
Ivy
Ivy, Sayra the whole mock thing might be coming from the End of year exams.
ReplyDeletePoor working conditions and poor pay at the National Exams office has reduced exam officials to selling the exams beforehand to make ends meet. Hence the notorious leakages we’ve witnessed in the last several years. In the past students who were suspected of having cheated had their results cancelled but soon regional political games found their way into that.
There is an allegation that other than cancel exam results for those suspected to have cheated last year, KNEC quietly asked school officials to provide mock results so instead of cancellation, the mock results were published in place of KCSE results in some cases. That’s why the kids are having beef with mocks.
The blame rests squarely on society's shoulders. We need a new constitution that will have the country being run properly. No landless or squatters in their own land; no absolute authority by the Executive; A functioning court system where the guilty are jailed; a functioning and corrupt free police service; zero tolerance on corruption by society as a whole.
ReplyDeleteAt the moment, this country is owned by the few who are above the law while the ordinary mwananchi has no government to protect their rights. The situation is one of desperation and hopelessness for these students.
There is no justice in Kenya to talk about... The students may be working hard but they realise that chances of their marks being reduced due to tribe is extremely high and hence the rebellion.
PKW
ReplyDeleteSorry 2nd Year for parallel students.
Sorry 3rd year for regular students
Ivy
The kenyan education system is a sham in too many ways. Everyone has their beef with it. Even after succesfully passing through the system myself I was never proud of it for a day.
ReplyDeleteOne cannot have a organised and responsive education system if you don't even see yourself as one nation. The leaders just wish that what the colonialist put in place works while they busy themselves stealing.
Nobody seems to have connected the education systems to the ovral plan to make this a great nation, cause they have not figured how to make money ou of it like Malkiat Singh.
My entire education life I saw the standards in everything lowering,all new and old institutions in kenya get worse by the day while the world is progresing.The primary school I went to was much better then than now, funny isn't it? Looks like a dump now.Things are supposed to have advanced, ya everywhere except kenya.
like pkw says the sytem is planned to fit the existing facilities( that are constantly getting worse) so that the % that passes is more a reflection of existing spaces at higher institutions than the real potential of kenyans. I know a very respected 'academic' who complanied that education has become diluted cause everyone now has a degree....thats the stinking attitude a degree is not for all those who can but to a select few.
These crazy highschool kids are from parents raised in the TKK era, survival for the fittest and short cuts. Merit went out the windo yesterday. probably being taught by teachers who have no descipline too......its a miracle they have not bommbed the schools.
It takes a lot t build a nation and just some negligence to screw it up.
The job is so hard and unrewarding that the when u see some people salivating and gunning for the top job one has to ask, if they have a clue as to what the real job involves.....kenya needs a seldless saviour it a pity that we have clowns at the fore front....taliking about strange visions. What are they smoking?
Sir Alex
These are the results of ODM using the youths to cause violence, root, kill and rape after last year election. So when these youths resume school, what do u expect? you dont have to be a rocket scientist taabu to read this connection, common sense. but since you dont see beyond your flat nose and your Raila,you cannot be blamed.
ReplyDeleteIvy
These are the results of ODM using the youths to cause violence, root, kill and rape after last year election. So when these youths resume school, what do u expect? you dont have to be a rocket scientist taabu to read this connection, common sense. but since you dont see beyond your flat nose and your Raila,you cannot be blamed.
ReplyDeleteIvy
Even students want 'haki yetu'
ReplyDeleteRaila and ODM just messed Kenya, the economy was growing at over 6%, inflation below 10%..these wimpers killed, looted and now the country is going to the dogs.
Only God will save us from this evil.
Kumekucha are all ODM lunatics singing Kajwangs lyrics..
Ntimama must be laughing all the way with his 'we killed 600 the other day'
ReplyDeletehow comes these Kumekucha rightious blogists are not comenting on this?
You are all plastic, blinded by u'r tribal hatred. U have gone to school but you are still uneducated!!!!
Ivy
Everyone please...
ReplyDeleteIt's not Lenana High school nor Lenana Boys but simply....
LENANA SCHOOL
Ivy CLONE @6.03,
ReplyDeleteYou can do better in your delusion to impersonate. At least do yourself a favour in borrowing some intelligence while doing so. So end up doing such a bad job to an extent you end up proppping yourself as a skunk which you unwittingly take home (head) as a trophy. Spare us the emptiness please, won't you? I am asking this knwoing well what to expect from you and your ilk. Pepo mbaya ushindwe.
wow,
ReplyDeleteseems the 'intelligent Taabu is rattled'
why insult, makes you look a fool likewise..truth does not have to be defended!! it stands.
your propaganda? well, that how u make u'r living anyway from ODM handouts....keeep it up flat nose boy!!
ha ha ha ah
What do you expect when an election is stolen, impunity is the rule of the day, examination marks from last year either "topped up or marked down" based on tribe?
ReplyDeleteWe are reaping exactly what we have sown.
Would be interested to get the figures of how many children and grandchildren of our leaders are going to school abroad, between England and even Switzerland being the favourites. In other words, whereas in the past some of our private schools had a reputation for creating and bringing up the future elite of the country, the current business and political elite has given up and prefers sending their kids abroad. So which reason should they have to help improving the existing system? The answer is simple: NONE.
ReplyDeleteSir Alex
ReplyDeleteThey smoke janjaweed......
Taabu....Can't wait!!!!The PL will just make us forget all the nonsense going on right now.
Ivy clone can't do better than that...I thought you knew that by now...I think i will take up UrXlnc advise and add something at the end of my thread.
Ivy
you spend months here calling for the killing and rape of thousands of Kenyans alafu ati now you pretend that to be concerned when high school kids do what your demon king and his demons in the ODMorons did.
ReplyDeleteWacha nao. they are also 'fighting fo democracy' Very soon even Mungiki will start their 'fight for democracy', and the sabots, taliban, you name every low life in Kenya. raila is their model
just one dead student? they have a long way to go to get to Ntimama's 600 kipsigis or raila's 1500 kyuks. Dot forget the ones he murdered in 1982 na akina mboya etc
ReplyDeleteamazing that we removed Corporal punishment and wonder why this children are very unruly...what are the teachers to do? Just allow them to instill some displine the hard unforgetable way into this lazy children
ReplyDeleteSayra from your contributions I can tell that you are intelligent and sharp and a leader. The people we need right now. At times you come off as naive in your points and kiddish something I hope you will work on. Else your posts and comments are very awakening.
ReplyDeleteYes tell them: Anon 6:14.
ReplyDeleteBack in the late 80's to be exact, it was in 87'. I went to a certain primo called "Naivasha Boarding".
ReplyDeleteTo get into that school, you had to do an interview the previous year and if you passed the interview (doing an entrance exam for standard 3)you had a secured spot for the following year.
Now in that school, exams were a must, by the time we fikad standard 8, we were doing almost 2 complete exams a month. I cant even count the number of exams I did that year. Basically, these exams did two things to us.
1.We were so prepared of KCPE that by the time it came, we were leading the nation.
2.It gave us a chance to improve and increased competition amongst ourselves (at least in theory we were chops).
All am saying is, mocks or no mocks, these exams need to be done. Atleast you will have done your part. If we equate this to what happened earlier this year we will go no where. It's like saying ati because we know the election will be stolen, lets not vote! Those saying that mocks shouldnt be done because of predetermined KCSE top ups is complete BS!!!
Bugz
ReplyDeleteI have my beef with canning. I have seen that stuff abused and it is nasty. Canning never stopped teen agers doing their thing. Remember when you went a did something wrong knowing very well that you will get a spanking for it but still went a head and did it?
Kenya is a nation without a coherent set of values, for various reasons. The 'leaders' are nothing but weed smoking goons. All they can boast is a western education and morderm appearace and ability to fetch a coin or two and unmitigated greed, but they have no substance that is required to form a nation. A task to noble to deep for them. There is a common wrong belief that to be man is about getting a degree and a set of balls.
A complet man is more than that, one needs a sense of responsibility to your community
a moral obligation to leave this a world a better place than you found it and to bring positive change to as many people as you can before you have to leave.
Some behave as if all they have to do is fill their stomachs and oversized egos and make sure nobody else has even half as mush fun.
We are cursed, such that instead of planning to equip, inspire and deploy our great natural resource :our youth, we are busy with our nuclear families overindulging them and creating a strange situation where among the youth their peers have nothing in common with them yet they are kenyans.
A culture of exclusion and pokets of benefit amid a sea of poverty and want.
Kenya is ripe for a revolution we cannot allow this madness to continue, a great nation does not just happen. Its must be forged by self sacrifice by right thinking people and it must start yesterday.
Sir Alex
most of the problems leading to strikes are due to bad management and lack of communication between the students prefects teachers and the principal. we should also know that anything can cause students to strike be it simple or complex so it is inevitable and everyone should be ready and not be caught pants down.
ReplyDeleteI was in a city primary school then sent upcountry for high school because my Dad dint want me in any day school in town thinking they strike often and such like nuisance they had.
My new high school was a prison and was lucky not to see any riots in the 4 years even though we had planned many by ourselves just to be thwarted.
the only good thing is investigations after riots tell the story and apprehending culprits is easy
The strikes in school is a symbol of how the country is running and headed. Facts are that there were few strikes in the past and more and more are now happening and more deadly this will not end unless the root cause are addressed. Setting up a commission is not part of the solution but prob as this is one of the things kenyans are fighting hard against how many useless commissions have been set b4.
ReplyDeleteKwale sorry to have beef with you but did you really attend sch in U.K your reasoning should be better than that unless experience or exposure hasnt taught you anything.
Ivy, i hear you.
ReplyDeleteAnon 7.42am
Thanx for pointing out my apparent strengths and weaknesses. How i wish a had an idea on how to work on reducing my naivety and kiddishness.
Anon 7.55am
Its good you pointed out you were in naivasha boarding. I know and understand ur lot very well. You need to know there is a difference between been taught and been drilled, you boys were drilled. As you say its true you were leading in the nation but you forgot to add that ones you guys went to high school somehow you could not manage.
Exams are good and should be done. Thing is they have been overrated and they should not be used to harass students and instill unnecessary fear.
Sayra - B.W., try to grow up and maybe after having become a wife and mother your kiddishness will disappear. Don't give up hope. Life still holds some surprises in store also for a young woman like you.
ReplyDeleteSayra: " forgot to add that ones you guys went to high school somehow you could not manage."
ReplyDeleteWe achieved what we had gone to school to do. Pass the main exam. If you want to get deeper into it, I know a bunch of ladies from PB Riruta who passed "KCSE" lakini cant manage life in campo.
The issue is not what happened afterwards, the issue is we were well prepared for the exam and pasuad.
Oh...now we have a cat fight going on. Ladies, calm down.
ReplyDeleteand as we conclude this discussion, it may be worthwhile to note that the current problems are faced with students who are able to raise funds to afford school fees.
ReplyDeletewith free secondary / primary school, the enrollment numbers will gradually go much higher increasing the likelihood of more dissent as schools cope with increased numbers while resources (teachers, tuition blocks/classrooms, boarding facilities, and other material items) are not increased to match larger population or at least not at the same pace.
i have yet to see a document that provides guidelines to school administrators on the strategy to be used in handling an anticipated increase in student population on account of free secondary education. in fact if i recall, there have been clauses restricting how many students per class in order to get access to funds. And these funds trickle in painfully slow, generating enormous pressure and overhead on the administrators who have to provide services daily to a youthful people who do not quite understand "wait for an hour".
lets face it, our leadership is permanently in crisis mode and will always be reactionary with the one solution, ...committee upon committee upon committee... and once the heat or spotlight moves to the next crisis (i.e a new even more horrific crisis), repeat the solution ... committee upon ....
UrXlnc
UrXinc,
ReplyDeleteYou have a way with the english language, boy you write it so beautifully - wish I could be half as articulate. Are you a writer by any chance?
From the first paragraph did you mean students who are unable...
...excerpt
and as we conclude this discussion, it may be worthwhile to note that the current problems are faced with students who are able to raise funds to afford school fees.
anon 8:50
ReplyDeletehehehe dont think its like that at all, but thank you
to answer you what i mean is that the current crop of students rioting, are those whose parents have done their best (juu chini) to try to get them through school (whether through significant sacrifice or because they can afford to or just because)
starting this year with introduction of free secondary school, those whose parents were so hard hit and just had simply no cash or means to send their kids to secondary school, will be a little more encouraged to try. i think there are a lot of bright kids out there who've had to drop out after primary school either because they can't afford tuition, bus fare, uniform and a host of other really basic stuff or who opted to use the meagre funds/resources available for the care of their younger siblings or in some cases elderly or sickly parents/guardians
so just trying to look ahead i think a number of these kids could start going back to school and there is a high likelihood of stretching existing facilities.
or put another way, those kids forced to drop out of school both in primary and secondary school for reasons related to finance will now be able to complete secondary school (remember thats part of the reason for the free education program i.e no child left behind)
its our inherent lack of or inadequate planning that always gets us into problems and like they say, the road to hell is paved with some of the most noble intentions
UrXlnc
just came across this article that puts numbers on my assertion above. appears to be another crisis being prepared for a future date unless some fellows put on their thinking caps
ReplyDeleteUrXlnc
John Maina, exposure of what? Knife and guns?
ReplyDelete