Photo/FILE Kenya National Examination Council chief executive officer Paul Wasanga.
Posted Friday, March 9 2012 at 18:50
IN SUMMARY
This week, MR PAUL WASANGA, the chief executive officer of the Kenya National Examinations Council, fields questions from readers
Are you aware that national schools also cheat in examinations, yet in most cases small schools in poor rural areas are victimised while the big schools celebrate good results?
Tito Kiptoo, via email
Any school where we detect cheating will have their results cancelled irrespective of the school’s category.
We have cancelled results of candidates from national schools before, so they are not exempt from our rules.
This notwithstanding, there is also a perception that good performances at national and other good schools is due to cheating and I must tell you that I do not subscribe to this notion.
National schools pick the top KCPE students and they have the best facilities and teachers. Why would anyone expect them not to perform well? It’s common sense.
Sometimes we blame the jembe if we can’t cultivate. No school should justify its poor performance by questioning the integrity of another school.
The two are not related. Each should compete with itself by setting the targets they would be happy to achieve.
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Is it that difficult to conduct a risk analysis to establish the root cause of examination leakages from within your institution?
Somebody has obviously been leaking out the examination questions to students every year and they must be emboldened because they seem confident that you are unable to catch them.
Oscar Ongeri, Nairobi
Oscar Ongeri, Nairobi
This is a judgmental and presumptuous question, but I will respond. I think it is unfair to pass harsh judgment on others devoid of facts.
We carry out a risk assessment and integrity test and analysis each year and other security checks that are done monthly which are very elaborate, but I cannot give details here.
There is a perception that KNEC officers leak examinations, but I can tell you without any fear of contradiction that this is simply a perception and has no truth in it.
It would be very easy to know if any officer leaks any examination because if one did so then a whole paper would be out there and much earlier than the examination period and this would be very easy to trace because each officer in KNEC has very specific duties.
We only start hearing of the so-called leakage after we distribute the papers, but not when such papers are in our custody.
Even then, what is called “leakage” is mainly extracts of parts of questions that seem to have been copied in a hurry and sent by SMS, which gives an impression of things happening between the distribution centre and the examination centre.
Such material cannot even help anyone, it simply makes the candidate who is misled to panic.
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I invested in my child’s learning and, as a nomadic parent, sacrificed in hard times. My child’s mock result was B+.
How would you feel as a parent like me to find that after all the hard work by teachers and students, the KCSE results shows Y, D- and D plain? How would you react?
Mohamed Ibrahim Cali, via email
Mohamed Ibrahim Cali, via email
I would feel very bad. It is, however, important as a parent to appreciate that mock results may have no relationship with the KNEC examination results because they are school-based and are not set using international standards, especially when the setters are not experienced.
A reflection of a Y, D etc from KNEC is really a true reflection of the candidate’s ability based on an objective examination validated by very qualified professionals.
How would you react if you were in an operation room and someone informed you that the doctor about to carry out an operation on you had cheated in his or her examination?
This would scare you immensely, whether or not the doctor was your son or daughter.
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This year over 5,000 candidates had their results struck out, meaning that virtually 12 years of school is wasted.
Wouldn’t it be better if the KCSE only counted for 20 percent of the final result with the other 80 percent being the average of all the results accrued over the four years right from Form One?
Ali Clay, via email
Ali Clay, via email
First, I wish to clarify that results were cancelled for only 2,927 candidates who cheated during the KCSE examination out of a total of 411,783 candidates, which is only 0.7 percent or so.
Secondly, your suggestion of 80 percent contribution from school-based assessment against 20 percent external assessment contribution would be a very ideal situation.
This, however, is not practical because of integrity concerns and the differences in terms of facilities and resources from school to school.
An 80 percent from school ‘A’ would have a different weighting from School ‘B,’ and the certification would, therefore, not be standard.
For fairness to be achieved, we would have to ensure marks are awarded objectively by every teacher and that all schools have similar facilities and teachers.
This, to me, is a very tall order. The only countries where I know this happens are Finland, South Korea and Singapore, but these have excess teachers, school facilities are the same, and teachers are the highest paid workers – more than even private sector workers because of the recognition that teachers are the most crucial link for a nation’s development.
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We are greatly concerned over the Home Science results as our students have never recorded such low marks. We are, therefore, appealing to you to re-assess the marks awarded to the students.
Mrs S. Kariuki (Githunguri High School), Mrs Julie Manji (Kiria-ini Girls), Grace Mutitu, Judy Mukima, Shikoti Girls and P. Wambugu via email.
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I sat KCSE last year and got a mean grade Y. Will I be allowed to resit the exam this year?
Maxwel Mugei, Mombasa
Maxwel Mugei, Mombasa
Yes, you can.
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How can we at Baringo Change Makers obtain KCSE and KCPE performances for Baringo County?
Philip Koimet, Baringo
Philip Koimet, Baringo
This information is available with us in KNEC at the research department. See them and you will be facilitated.
What are you doing to ensure that invigilators, who have been getting peanuts for a heavy and risky job, are better paid?
Cheruiyot Nicholas, via email
Cheruiyot Nicholas, via email
We review payments to our contracted professionals every two years. We know the responsibility of these officers is heavy but sometimes it is not just the money that is important but also the sense of duty and responsibility.
It should not be forgotten that supervisors and invigilators are teachers who are also earning salaries at the time of examinations and that being involved with KNEC work is an added advantage to their career growth as well.
At the same time, KNEC does not charge KCPE and KCSE at cost.
KCPE costs us about Sh1,200 per candidate to run and we charge only Sh500 per candidate, while we charge about Sh4,000 per KCSE candidate against a unit cost of Sh6,500 per candidate.
We, therefore, do not have sufficient funds to run examinations. We are just on the margins.
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Results are cancelled because a candidate has cheated and there is nothing else KNEC can do. Candidates must not cheat if they do not want their results cancelled.
Tito Kiptoo, via email
I write a personal letter to each candidate a few days before any examination and impress upon them the importance of upholding integrity, but I also clearly warn them that if they cheat, their results will be cancelled.
We must learn to take responsibility for our actions. The Government has done its best to bring sanity in exams, but you must remember it takes two to tango; the students and the society must do their bit.
You cannot steal and blame the government for not stopping you from stealing or ask where the Government or KNEC was when I was cheating.
Our society has a huge integrity deficit and what we are seeing is a reflection of our society – you and me. Must we be policed all the time?
If the society was morally upright, then there would be no need for supervisors and invigilators, instead we would give each school the examination to manage and return to us for marking. Can you imagine what would happen if we tried that?
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