Inter Press Service - December 17, 2003
Joyce Mulama

At present, students undergo eight years of primary education, four years in secondary school - and an additional four years at university. This constitutes the so-called "8-4-4" system, which has been in place for nearly 15 years.

Teachers report that pupils need to be given extra tuition in the evenings, over weekends and holidays, because the broad syllabus cannot be completed within stipulated time frames.

Initially, "8-4-4" required primary school children to tackle 13 subjects a year - and secondary students, 12. After protests from teachers, this was reduced to eight and seven subjects respectively.

Francis Ng'ang'a, Secretary-General of the Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT), believes the system does more harm than good. "A number of children have been stressed by this system. They cannot handle the workload," he told IPS.

"They have since resorted to taking drugs, and in the end dropped out of school," Ng'ang'a added.

Parents seem to agree. "Young children have to carry and study many books when in class, do homework in up to five subjects, and revise (for) extra hours at home. Really, there is no time left for children to be children," says Imelda Atido, mother of a class four pupil in a Nairobi primary school.

In addition, critics of "8-4-4" claim the system fails the most important test of all: maintaining high educational standards.

They've called for the implementation of recommendations put forward by a commission established in 1998 to look into the future of the system. This body suggested scrapping "8-4-4" on the grounds that it was inefficient and costly. Its findings have since been shelved.

"We confirmed that there was too much overloading (of) students, which was responsible for a mass drop-out of pupils in classes one and eight. Half a million pupils dropped out since the re-inception of "8-4-4" (in 1985) until the formation of the commission," says Davy Koech, Chairman of the body.

"The system was also found to be costly because parents had to buy teaching materials since the government could not provide (them). As a result, many children whose parents could not afford (these things) were locked out of school," he added.

But at a conference held in Nairobi last month, Education Minister George Saitoti defended "8-4-4".

"The system has so far served Kenyans well in that our graduates have been able to obtain admissions in various institutions all over the world, and have always excelled," he noted.

And, certain education analysts have broken ranks with teachers to back him. "Our children are able to compete and out-perform out there, because they are used working hard in school and they are able to cope," says Shiphra Gichaga, National Coordinator at the Kenya chapter of the Forum for African Women Educationalists.

The introduction of free primary education in Kenya at the start of this year has further complicated the debate on education. Some teachers claim that classrooms are far more crowded as a result of the new policy - and that this has aggravated the problems allegedly created by "8-4-4".

"The schools are few and therefore congested. Some classrooms accommodate more than 100 pupils at any given time," says primary school teacher Ernest Inganga. According to the education ministry, Kenya has 17,600 public primary schools.

"The pupils learn in shifts - some in the morning, others in the afternoon - taken by the same teacher, who ends up.exhausted," Inganga says. "This is not a conducive learning environment."

The introduction of free primary education saw an additional 1.3 million children who had previously been excluded from the system, enrolled in school. This increased to 8.5 million the number of students in primary school - but government estimates that 300,000 children are still missing out on their basic education.

As a result, KNUT is demanding tougher laws regarding education. "A legal framework must be put in place to ensure that free primary education is compulsory, because our assessment is that some parents do not bring children to school," says Ng'ang'a.

"They have engaged the children in child labour exercises," he notes, adding that "Only with such a law will the country be able to boast of meeting the millennium development goal of ensuring universal primary education by 2015."

Kenya's Assistant Minister of Education, Beth Mugo, has rejected claims that her department is under-resourced, and unable to implement the free primary education policy properly.

"The education ministry consumes more money than any other ministry - and besides, we have support from development partners," Mugo told IPS.

Sources in the ministry say the education budget stands at about 947 million dollars. But, they were unable to give an estimate of how much educating 8.5 million primary school children actually costs.

Mugo says there are also efforts to deploy tutors in understaffed areas and increase the pupil-teacher ratio, which is one of the lowest in Africa. Following the leap in enrolment, it stands at 39 to one.

As is the case with many other developing countries, Kenya's education sector has been adversely affected by AIDS. "It is not easy to state how many are dying but I assure you it is.a good number, hence our setting up of an AIDS education awareness programme to address the problem," says Ng'ang'a.

"We have embarked on this project to educate our 240,000 members and we need goodwill from the government - because teachers are the best vehicles to transmit any information, including (that) on HIV/AIDS," he adds. (END/AF/EA/DV/ED/SD/JM/JH/03)

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