The Government has awarded the second cohort of 9,000 Elimu Scholarship beneficiaries, under the Kenya Secondary Education Quality Improvement Project.
The successful applicants emerged from a thorough selection process involving 54,000 applicants who sat the 2020 Kenya Certificate of Primary Education Examination (KCPE).
Speaking Thursday during the launch of the Elimu Scholarship Programme at the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD), Education Cabinet Secretary Professor George Magoha urged partners to step in and assist more than 40,000 applicants who were not selected.
“I am therefore urging other partners to step in and borrow a leaf from the Elimu Scholarship Programme and assist the many needy and vulnerable learners out there who need support,” said CS Magoha
The CS thanked the Equity Foundation for its Wings to Fly Programme, the KCB Foundation, Jomo Kenyatta Foundation and other organisations that support the learning costs for needy and vulnerable learners.
He appreciated the Equity Foundation for helping the Government to select the 9,000 Elimu Scholarship beneficiaries using their already tested and proven criteria of identifying needy and vulnerable children.
The CS pointed out that the Elimu Scholarship Programme targeted 110 Sub-Counties and 15 urban centres with informal settlements.
“This year we affirmatively increased the allocation of learners from urban centres with informal settlements from 25% to 33.3 % of the 9,000 slots to cushion the very vulnerable households and give hope to the less fortunate,” he added.
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Elimu Scholarship Programme is testimony to President Uhuru Kenyatta’s motto of leaving no child behind in the provision of basic education to all, adding that he witnessed the selection process and it was fair and it will change lives and families.
Kenya is committed to fast-tracking reforms in education, to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promotion of lifelong learning opportunities for all learners.
The CS already revised downwards the fees for secondary schools and called upon all stakeholders to ensure that the guidelines are adhered to.
This is because of the short nature of the 2021 academic calendar that was affected by COVID-19.
National schools will pay Ksh.8,500 less while extra County and County schools will pay Ksh.5,500 less.
This means the new fees in National schools will be Sh45,054 while learners in Extra County and County Schools will pay Ksh.39,554Schools as schools are set to reopen on July 26, 2021.
It is a reprieve for parents in the country who are yet struggling to raise school fees in the wake of a tight economy that has been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic.
Early in the year, the government reduced the yearly school fees paid by secondary school students by thousands of shillings.
Students in national and extra-county schools located in Nairobi, Mombasa, Nakuru, Kisumu, Thika, Nyeri and Eldoret will pay a maximum annual fee of Ksh.45,000 up from Ksh.55,000.
“My Ministry has prioritised quality based educational reforms, which include implementation of the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) with a focus on nurturing every learner’s potential,” said Magoha
The CS urged the beneficiaries to embrace the opportunity seriously and focus on their studies in the various schools where they have been admitted to.
They shall be monitored to ensure they complete a whole cycle of secondary education.
