Ministry of Education Reveal Plans to Merge Schools With Low Enrollment

The Ministry of Education has announced that the government is in the process of merging some secondary schools with low student enrollment.

Speaking at a public event on Saturday, March 15, Basic Education Principal Secretary Julius Bitok said the merger will enable the government to convert the institutions into more useful facilities.

The PS noted that the government will, in turn, expand the capacity of other schools with high enrollment, through building more dorms and classrooms to accommodate students who will be transitioning.

The PS did not, however, clarify the exact timeline of the merging or what the government plans to convert the schools to.

“Most of the small schools we have to rethink what to do about them, and it may be to convert them to other things, by ensuring we expand capacity and ensuring that we have very good schools across the country,” Bitok stated.

“We will ensure that we pour more resources into the education system to ensure that schools have better labs, dormitories, and enough teachers to ensure that learners have an opportunity to experience great schools,” he added.

Earlier this year, various schools across the country found themselves in the middle of a crisis after a low turnout of learners who were transitioning to grade 10.

Several schools, especially the category four, formerly known as sub-county schools,  reopened to receive learners transitioning to senior school under the competency-based curriculum, only to find classrooms largely deserted, with some recording no students at all.

The headteachers of these institutions blame the dismal turnout on the new method of placements, noting that most of the students required to report to the schools allegedly come from faraway areas.

They also blamed the transfer window that the government opened for students to change schools, noting that the review and transfer process complicated the situation further.

But on the other hand, some schools reportedly admitted students at full capacity, even forcing parents to return home with the students, despite having placement letters with top-tier schools having received more students than the capacity they can admit and the available slots.

Last year in October, Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba had said that the merging of schools with low enrollment would be fundamental in ensuring transparency in capitation disbursement to education institutions.

”We are doing something about the number of ghost schools in the country. We have noticed that some of those institutions and the statistics we are getting are that some of the schools we have are having less than 10 students,” Ogamba decried.