A primary school head in Teso North sub county In Busia County is receiving accolades after her school emerged the best in the implementation of the School Improvement Program (SIP).
Koruruma Primary School head teacher, Linet Anyang was on Tuesday granted the honour to address and share lessons on SIP good practices during the 2019 Dialogue on Education Quality at Kisoko Girls Secondary School.
According to her, the school received a grant of Sh500, 000 from the National Government following the roll out of SIP in 2015 and has since managed to construct pit latrines for girls, procured text books as well as a water tank.
In her address, Anyang noted that the programme targeted schools that scored below average in the 2012 and 2013 Kenya Certificate of Primary Examination (KCPE) and her school fell among them.
“Koruruma was ranked among the bottom five primary schools in the county in the 2012 KCPE, but when I took over the management of the school, I turned around the performance through improvement of infrastructure and learner attendance,” she recounted, while acknowledging
that school absenteeism is one of the factors which bring down the performance of learners in Busia County.
The head teacher said the reintroduction of school feeding program, especially between January and May will curb cases of absenteeism.
She also noted that ill health is one of the leading causes of school absenteeism recommending that schools ought to improve the condition of washrooms, including fitting them with hand washing facilities.
The head teacher also took the opportunity to hail the government for its initiative of supplying sanitary towels to schools saying it will help a great deal in boosting girls’ performance. However, she said the supply should be made regularly throughout the year.
“At Koruruma primary school we took our own initiative and started providing girls with reusable sanitary towels, made from locally available materials. We are picking up and my appeal is that other schools should also
embrace such initiatives to curb school absenteeism due to lack of sanitary towels,” she stated.
School Improvement Program (SIP) is an intervention measure by the government targeting 4000 primary schools that were performing below a mean score of 243 marks in Kenya Certificate of Primary Education. It
is a component of Kenya Primary Education Development project.
The schools that received the grant are spread across the counties of Bungoma, Busia, Meru, Isiolo, Embu, Mombasa, Lamu, Garissa, Wajir, Homabay Migori, Elgeyo Marakwet, Nandi, Kirinyaga, Kiambu, Nairobi,
Elgeyo Marakwet and Nyeri.
By Melechezedeck Ejakait
