Gordon Opiyo has written an article revealing the rot in the Ministry of Education, thanks to our savior Fred Matiangi.
Without editing anything, here is the interesting article from Gordon:
What Matiang’i and KNEC has done is to stop our education system from going down the drain.
Cartels had taken over the education system, and had there been no intervention, we would have ended up as the laughing stock of Africa.
First, Kenyans should stop this silly obsession with University Degrees. I have been in interview panels, I have employed a number of people- and truth is this- Our University System is a total mess. You get people with Upper Second Degrees that cannot draft a simple letter.
Truth is that Commercial Interests took over, and Degrees became commodities to be bought and sold.
This had to stop. There are other qualifications in life and having a degree should not be a measure of success.
Second, before the cartels took over, As were rare. In the first KCSE in 1989 Naeem Samnakay was the top student, with a clean A. All over Kenya, there were four As. Maseno School- one of the top Schools in Kenya had only 1 A- in the name of John Odhiambo. Students with B- and above were less than 1,000 nationwide, and the University entry grade had to be dropped from B- to C+. The following year in 1990 Kenya had five As nationwide. Maseno School had only one A– I guess he was called Kizito Asava, the third KCSE Kenya had only four As Nationwide, and Maseno had only 1 A-, someone called Makori. In the fourth KCSE in 1992, I guess Kenya had 8 As nationally and Maseno School (which was number 12 nationally) had only 3 A- led by Wilfred Oguta, Moses Sande Lukale and Moses Oyugi.
Why am I able to remember the names of the As and A-s more than 20 years later? Because scoring an A those days was no mean feat. Those that qualified to University did so on merit.
Then commercialization of degrees started in 1997, when Prof Eshiwani introduced something called Summer Semester in Kenyatta University. It was a concept where moneyed and wealthy students could pay extra fees and speed up their degree course.
Within no time, other Universities borrowed the concept, and by 2004, University Education ceased being about research- but a conveyor belt for certificates .
In order to continue making money, the cartels running the University system colluded with KNEC and Ministry of Education to increase students with C+ in order to expand the customer base.
Cartels like KNUT and other Politicians were brought in to praise the “good results”. We had ridiculous results with 2,000 As in a particular year!!!!
But from last year- Matiang’i burst the bubble. The fake As, Bs and Cs were stopped, and Kenyans brought back to reality.
But do not expect those enjoying the gravy train to remain silent. Already, their mouthpiece Sossion has spoken. They have sponsored busybody Omutata to go to court.
We are going to face some interesting time ahead.
