Prison inmates performed exemplary well in this year’s Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) in Machakos County compared to their counterparts in private classes, a report from the Machakos Sub-county Adult and Continuing Education office has revealed.
According to the report which was availed to KNA on Monday, while none of the eight private candidates managed to score 250 marks, four out of the nine candidates from the Machakos G.K Prison scored above 250 marks.
The best candidate, Muindi Kelvin Maundu managed to garner 376 marks, followed by Mbaluto Francis Mulinge with 352 marks, Nzau Oliva Munyiva with 298 marks and King’eli Daniel Nthenge with 256 marks.
Overall inmates posted a mean score of 210.1 while private candidates only managed to get a mean score of 183.5.
The best placed private candidate Luke Vincent Munyao managed a paltry 231 marks with Mwongela Magdalene Kanini pulling the rear with 125 marks.
Mbithi Boniface Mwanzia from Machakos Prison who was bottom placed managed to score a total of 152 marks.
A total of 167 adult candidates registered for this year’s Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) exams in Machakos County compared to 62 who sat for the KCPE exams.
Machakos County Director for Adult and Continuing Education, Mr Geoffrey Jade, said among those who did the just concluded exams included 15 prisoners.
Nine of the inmates were from Machakos GK Prison while six were from Yatta GK Prison.
The Department also registered eight adult learners from the Machakos School for the Deaf.
“This year a total of 62 adult learners registered for the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education exams while another 167 candidates enlisted for the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education exams . We had two examination centres in Machakos Town Sub-county; one at the Machakos G.K prison and the other one at the Machakos School for the Deaf,” said the Director.
The Officer, however, cited lack of ample learning resources and teaching staff as one the biggest challenges hampering the smooth operations of the Department.
He revealed that majority of teachers in the County have no designated classes from where to work from, a hurdle which forces them to spend much time looking for venues.
“The main challenges facing us are lack of venues on which to host our learners .We similarly lack enough teaching resources such as books and other materials necessary for our work and the little we get are not enough to cater each and every student, ” he pointed out.
The Department currently depends on the services of 32 fulltime instructors and 70 part time instructors to manage the 156 centres located in the eight Sub-counties.
This year a total of 1,089,671 candidates across the country sat for KCPE exams compared to 1,060,703 last year.
By Samuel Maina/Patrick Kioko
