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Hardly three weeks before the commencement of this year’s Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examination, a House committee has indicted the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec) following confirmation that there were cases of malpractices in the last year’s examinations.

The irregularities were due to early exposure of afternoon examination papers, mobile phones seized from some examination centres as well as some students being found with unauthorised written-on materials among others.

In a detailed report tabled in the National Assembly, the Education Committee chaired by Tinderet MP Julius Melly said that incidences of malpractices in last year’s exams were perpetuated through the use of technology, including via social media. Social media platforms such as Telegram and Signal were used to leak examinations to teachers and students and were preferred because the source of the information is not traceable.

The findings of the committee follow months of investigations into last year’s examinations after concerns arose regarding allegations of examination malpractices within the country.

Reads the committee’s report: “The Committee observed that there were isolated incidences of examination malpractices in the 2022 KCSE”. The committee noted that its decision was based on submissions from various stakeholders including examiners who confirmed that there were cases of malpractices.

The markers, however, noted that the process of reporting the malpractices was tedious and thus some of them did not report cases of malpractices for fear harassment and intimidation by chief examiners.
According to the committee, malpractices were reported in Mombasa, after a respondent appearing before them alleged that students had early exposure to the examination and that they were trying to share the exams with other schools.

The students used signal and Telegram applications to relay examination information between 4am and 5am.

In addition, the committee noted that some principals visited the Sub-County Directors of Education to influence the choice of supervisors to be deployed to their schools to assist them secure higher mean grades and promotions.

Reads the report: “The Nairobi County Education Office informed the Committee that a number of cases of examination malpractices were reported during the 2022 KCSE examination. In some instances, mobile phones were seized from examination centres and rooms.”

In Embu, it was alleged that teachers had observed similar answers given by students, with teachers saying that they marked some scripts with similar answers.

They gave an example of one examination centre where they alleged all students wrote similar wrong answers in the History Paper II, Question 23, which required candidates to identify three groups that cannot contest for political office in Britain.

According to the respondent, a whole school wrote Neo-British citizens instead of non-British citizens. Still in Embu, the report says that education officials indicated that there was an attempt to leak the KCSE Chemistry Practical Paper by the subject teacher.

The teacher worked out all the questions in the paper and had photos taken by his colleague and sent to other unauthorised persons. This led to the interdiction of two teachers, together with the school secretary and the principal because of negligence while the deputy principal was transferred.

In Garissa, KNEC singled out an incident which involved more than 100 candidates, 29 mobile phones were intercepted by security and examination officials.

Reads the report: “The case was handed over to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations for further investigation and possible prosecution. However, the candidates’ results were not cancelled because the mobile phones were confiscated before the examination.”

Following the confirmation of the malpractices, the committee blamed parents, teachers, invigilators, supervisors, principals and Knec officials whom they said were the major players and orchestrators of the examination irregularities. This the committee noted is because most of the stakeholders and respondents blamed the said institutions for the malpractices.

In addition, the committee also raised concerns that some schools levy motivation fees on parents to pay examiners, bribe invigilators, security officers, supervisors, Ministry of Education (MoE) and Knec officials in what is commonly referred to as ‘fuel’ to facilitate exam malpractice.

Further the committee was told that the pressure from parents and Boards of Management on school principals to register high mean grades or risk being transferred also contributed to exam malpractices

According to the MPs, the Multi-Agency Approach involving the Ministry of Interior and National Administration, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) and the Communications Authority (CA) of Kenya in the management of examination was not effective in curbing examination malpractices as intended.

“From the foregoing, the Committee found out that there were isolated cases of early exposure that facilitated examination cheating and malpractices. These cases were orchestrated by teachers, invigilators, supervisors, principals, security officials and Knec officials. Motivational speakers also played a role in fueling the cases of examination malpractices by claiming to have knowledge of the questions that will appear in the main examinations.”

In its submissions to the committee, the Kenya Secondary Schools Heads Association (KESSHA) office in Nakuru stated that the significant dependence on conventional professions such as Medicine, Engineering, Architecture, Education, and Law as pathways to advancement creates substantial pressure on students to excel in KCSE which in turn compels schools to find ways to meet these expectations, sometimes resulting in school managers resorting to examination cheating.

The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) on its part revealed that a fourth-year university student in the Rift Valley region defrauded the public by selling counterfeit examination papers on Telegram.

Reads the report: “Some of the participants also agreed that examination cheating happens due to expectations on principals to produce exemplary results to avoid transfers. Moreover, the Committee noted that TSC promotions should be based on value addition, for example, infrastructural development.”

A respondent from Kakamega said that examination malpractices start with Knec, where some answers put in the answer sheets resembled the marking scheme word for word although Knec indicated that marking schemes are securely developed after each examination paper is sat by the candidates.