nfluence Of Socio-Economic Factors On Pupils’ Transition Rate To Secondary Schools In Kibra Subcounty, Nairobi City County, Kenya

Abstract

This research supports the GOK in its effort towards achieving 100% transition from primary to secondary schools which has not been attained to date thus forming the basis of study. It based on influence of socio-economic factors on pupils’ transition rate to secondary schools in Kibra Sub-County, Nairobi City County, Kenya. The four objectives were; hidden costs of education, parents’ income level, parents’ education level and teenage pregnancies and early marriages. The study employed a descriptive survey research design and the target population consisted of all the 10 head teachers of public primary schools in Kibra Sub-County, 1,150 pupils in standard eight classes 2019 and the Kibra Sub-County Director of Education. For sampling, the researcher used the readily available table from Krejcie et al (1970). According to this experts, When “N” which is the population size is = 10 then the “S” which is sample size has to be 10 (refer to appendix). Therefore, data were collected from all the ten public primary schools in the sub-county. For standard eight pupils, the researcher tested 30% of the total number of standard eight pupils per school which was 345, all the 10 head teachers of primary schools and the Sub-County Director of Education was interviewed. Questionnaires and interview schedule were instruments for study. To enhance the validity of the instruments the researcher sought approval by the University supervisors and collected data herself. For analysis, the researcher sort out the questions based on completeness and accuracy considering the incomplete as spoiled. Qualitative data were analyzed qualitatively i.e. data from individual interview and open-ended queries through data analysis and subjects and patterns consistent to research queries helping the researcher in categorizing the data. Codes and themes were given manually by the researcher while statistical information which is quantitative data was analyzed by the help of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) which is convenient in handling a large amount of data. Frequency Distributions, means and percentages which is descriptive statistics were run on all the data, evaluating it to check the applicability in answering research questions and correlation analysis employed to establish the correlations between independent variables. Qualitative data gained from the interview and open-ended queries were analyzed qualitatively through content analysis and prepared into themes and patterns consistent with the research queries. The study concluded that, transition from primary to secondary schools in Kibra Sub- County is highly influenced by the income level of parents and the education level of parents. Hidden costs of education, early marriages and teenage pregnancies do influence transition rate to some extent. To align to sustainable development goals, achieve Kenya Vision 2030 and realize education objectives, the Government of Kenya should standardize hidden costs of education at basic level, initiate empowerment policies for people to improve living standards, monitor and evaluate implemented policies. Encouraging collaborative multidisciplinary research such as the study by AGI-K and sensitize citizens on education value. National research on transition rate at basic education level and would save the Ministry of Education and the Government of Kenya on high costs of Education.