| dc.description.abstract | The topic of the study was ‘The influence of school infrastructure on Kenya Certificate of
Primary Education performance in Central Division of Machakos District. The purpose of the
study was to investigate the influence of school infrastructure on Kenya Certificate of Primary
Education (KCPE) performance in Central Division of Machakos District.
The study had five objectives in which it sought to establish the extent to which a learner
protected school environment influences performance in KCPE. The study also sought to
establish to what extent school buildings influence performance in KCPE. The study was also
aimed at establishing the extent to which a health and hygiene promoting school influences
KCPE performance. The study further sought to find out the influence a nutrition promoting
school had on KCPE performance. The influence of school equipment on KCPE performance
was also looked into in the study. The study employed descriptive survey design from
randomly selected public primary schools in Central Division of Machakos district. Since all
school could not participate in the study a sample size was determined using the formulae
according to Taro Yamane’s (1967) Formulae for determining sample size. The sample size for
the study comprised of 52 head teachers, 161 classroom teachers and 195 standard eight pupils.
The total respondents in the study were 408. The instruments for data collection included
questionnaires for the class eight pupil and the classroom teachers, an interview schedule for
the head teachers and an observation guide which was used by the researcher in assessing the
schools physical infrastructure. The research instruments were piloted in 2 public primary
schools for reliability. The pilot schools were not part of the sampled schools. The split half
method was used to determine the reliability of the instruments. The validity of the instruments
was determined by experts in the department of Extra Mural Studies among them the
researchers supervisor. The data was coded manually and later analyzed quantitatively and
qualitatively using descriptive statistics and Excel computer program (SPSS).Pearson’s Product
Moment Correlation Coefficient was used to analyze data from inferential statistics. The
findings were presented on frequency tables and percentages. The findings revealed that most
of the schools in Central Division lacked safe and protective environment for learning, the
school buildings were inadequate and did not adhere to the safety standards manual in
government institutions from the Ministry of Education (MOE 2001) as in most schools the
doors opened to the inside and windows had grills. Most of the schools lacked water for
drinking and hand washing, only 5 schools out of the 69 schools in the Division had a feeding
program in place and most learners had to learn on empty stomachs especially in the
afternoons. The text books were inadequate with majority of the pupils sharing books in the
ratio of 1:3 or 1:4 in most schools resulting to a below average KCPE performance trend in
public primary schools in the area therefore necessitating the Governments’ and policy maker’
intervention for quality school infrastructure in order to achieve quality education in Central
Division. The researcher came up with the following recommendations;-a supportive
environment should be created in order to upgrade the physical condition of the schools with
respect to safety and protection of both teachers and learners to facilitate increased learner
enrolment, retention and completion, funds should be availed to upgrade the school
infrastructure in public primary schools to address the issues of overcrowding and congestion
in the classes, health education with a focus on personal hygiene and life skills should be
integrated into the school curriculum and teachers should be trained in health and hygiene and
should work in cooperation with the parents so that health and hygiene are extended home, it
should be ensured that children in public schools access feeding program on regular basis as
this is an intervention that affect not only their health but also their academic performance, the
current disbursement of capitation of Ksh. 1,020 per child for FPE should be reviewed upwards
to reflect the rate of inflation as this will improve the text book pupil ratio as well as physical
infrastructure and especially this time when primary schools are expected to embrace ICT. | en |
