NAIROBI, Kenya, Oct 21 – The Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations kicked off on Wednesday morning in all parts of the country.
The Ministry of Education said it had tightened security to guard against any forms of cheating.
Minister Sam Ongeri recently declared that the examinations would only take place in the mornings, as part of measures to curb cases of cheating. This would be the first time in the history of 8-4-4 that examinations take place for half a day.
Prof Ongeri said all invigilators are under instructions to strictly adhere to the time-tables of each examination paper.
In Nyanza Province, the Director of Education Geoffrey Cherongis said no hitch had been reported.
“All the schools here are going on with the examinations and they started at 8am as scheduled,” he said.
Mr Cherongis spoke to Capital News from Siaya district where he was monitoring the start of the examinations. He said invigilators and supervisors will be very strict to ensure cases of cheating in examinations are curtailed in the province.
Kisumu East District Education Officer Rebecca Butalanyi also reported a smooth start of the examinations exercise.
Ms Butalanyi said the examination papers arrived at the schools in time noting that transportation was well organised by the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) which gave their district four vehicles for the exercise.
No hitch had been reported in Nairobi, Mombasa, Central, Western and other regions in the country but there were fears the ongoing El-Nino rains would affect some of the schools in flooded areas.
Commissioner of Prisons Isaiah Osugo told Capital News that 28 Prisoners were among students sitting for this year’s KCSE.
He said the number has slightly declined as compared to last year because most prisoners did not enroll for the examinations.
“Last year, the number was higher than this. We had more students who enrolled for the examinations. The group sitting for the exams this year is well prepared and we are optimistic they will perform well,” he said.
Mr Osugo said a further 508 will be sitting for Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examinations next month.
Every year, at least 600 prisoners sit for both the KCSE and KCPE examinations.
More than 330,000 students are sitting for this year’s exam.
About The Author
