Factors Influencing Perfomance In Kenya Certificate Of Primary Education Examination In Public Primary Schools In Kairuri Zone, Embu North District, Kenya

Abstract

The Kenyan Government is committed to enabling majority of its citizen’s access to education through establishment of free primary education programme. However, despite all this effort, the Education sector continues to face myriads of problems, especially declining performance of pupils in Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) in public primary schools. Kairuri Zone in Embu North District Embu County is among the many areas witnessing poor performance in KCPE in the past five years. As such, this study is designed to find out the underlying factors leading to poor performance in KCPE in the Zone with special focus on all public primary schools in the Zone. The objectives of the study determine the influence of: parents’ participation in school activities, pupils’ discipline, teachers’ factors, and headteachers’ management styles on pupils’ academic performance in Kairuri Zone, Embu North District . A descriptive research design was used. The target population comprised of an Education Officer in charge of the zone, parents, the headteachers’, teachers and pupils from public primary schools in Kairuri Zone. A census approach was used to select the Education officer; all the 13 public primary schools and random sampling was used to select parents, teachers and pupils for the study. The sample population size comprises of 182 parents, 13 head teachers, 44 teachers and 182 pupils. Questionnaires have been the main instrument for data collection. Data was analyzed using statistical package for Social Sciences software, descriptive statistics and tables. The results of this study are important to the Ministry of Education and other stake holders as they are to form the baseline information for development of strategies for improving academic performance in the area