The Education Cabinet Secretary, George Magoha, has given Grade 6 parents and children green light to select national junior secondary schools found away from their home counties.
Magoha said this following panic by parents who are at crossroads on whether to chose schools far away especially after announcement by the CS that Grade 7 learners will be day scholars.
However Magoha has assured the parents that its okay for them to help their children chose such pretigious schools.
“Children are free to choose schools they want especially those eying prestigious national schools,” said Prof Magoha as he urged pupils to consider schools near their homes so that they can be close to their parents.
The selection exercise for junior secondary has been marred with confusion with most Grade 6 parents unaware of the selection rules and process.
Grade Six learners in the CBC syllabus are required to pick 12 schools for the Junior Secondary school.
According to guidelines issued by Knec each learner shall be expected to select:
Two National;
Two Regional;
Two County;
Four Sub-county.
The selection exercise for junior secondary which was scheduled to end on 31st August has now been extended tAccording to Knec circular all schools must ensure Grade 6 learners have done the written tests by 9th September and their scores uploaded on the online portal by 16th September when schools will be closing.o 10th September 2022.
The Grade 6 learners will sit for their final exams in primary school known as KPSEA in November this year before transiting to Grade 7 in January 2023.
Magoha has been urging parents to select day schools near their homes for their children joining Junior Secondary.
“We encourage parents to get schools close to them, especially those who really want to have their children near them,” said Prof Magoha.
The CS also said parents who would wish to send their children to private schools are free to do so.
“We encourage parents to sit together with their children and chose schools together,” Magoha said.
The CS has also assured that all Grade 6 learners will be placed in Grade 7 after successfully completing their primary education.
This means in January 2023, approximately 2,512,467 learners will join Secondary Education in accordance with the Government policy on 100% Transition of learners in Basic Education.
These include 1,268,830 learners enrolled in Grade 6 in 2022 who will transition to Junior Secondary School (JSS) at Grade 7 under the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) and 1,243,637 Standard 8 cohort of 2022 who will transition to Form 1 under the 8:4:4 system.
The Grade 6 learners will be placed in both public and private junior secondary schools next year.
Transition of Grade 6 learners from Upper Primary to Junior Secondary School will be guided by the assessment outcomes of the Kenya Primary School Education Assessment (KPSEA).
KPSEA will be a combination of the learners’ scores attained from the School Based Assessments (SBA) administered at Grade 4, 5 and 6 and National summative assessment to be administered in November year.
The School Based Assessments for each of the three Grades (i.e. Grades 4, 5 and 6) will constitute 20%, with the SBAs cumulatively accounting for 60% of scores to be used in reporting as learners transit to Junior Secondary School.
The grade 6 learners have already done their Knec assessment projects and practicals and were expected to start the written tests on Monday 29th August.
According to Knec circular all schools must ensure Grade 6 learners have done the written tests by 9th September and their scores uploaded on the online portal by 16th September when schools will be closing.
