The 2025 national examinations and assessment season has officially been launched, setting the stage for one of the busiest education calendars in Kenya’s history. The launch took place on Friday, October 3, 3035, at the New Mitihani House in South C, Nairobi.

Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba and KNEC Chief Executive Officer David Njengere led the ceremony, where new guidelines were issued to ensure smooth and credible administration of exams across the country.

“The field administration of the 2025 examination and assessments is scheduled to start on Friday, October 17 and end on Friday, November 21, 2025. The examination and assessments cycle, however, began with registration of candidates, which was undertaken between 30th January and 30th March 2025,” KNEC CEO David Njengere stated.

He revealed that this year marks a historic moment, as the first class of Competency-Based Curriculum learners will sit the inaugural Kenya Junior School Education Assessment (KJSEA).

“A total of 1,298,089 candidates registered for the Kenya Primary School Education Assessment (KPSEA), the pioneers of the Competency-Based Education, will sit the inaugural Kenya Junior School Education Assessment (KJSEA) this year. A total of 1,130,669 candidates have registered for this assessment. As such, KNEC will be administering the National examination and assessments to a total of 3,424,836 candidates,” he explained.

Logistic Plans

KNEC also outlined the massive logistical plan required to handle the exams. “During the 2025 KCSE examination, KNEC will involve 10,765 centre managers, 12,126 supervisors, 54,782 invigilators, 22,247 security officers and 2,692 drivers. Centres that have both KJSEA and KPSEA will be managed by 24,213 centre managers, 26,479 supervisors and 125,492 invigilators,” read a statement from KNEC.

To tighten exam security, Njengere said the measures that curbed early exposure of KCSE papers in the past two years will continue.

“Over the last two years, we have successfully addressed the challenge of early exposure to the second session paper in KCSE by implementing a double collection of papers for both sessions. This practice will continue this year. To further ease this process, KNEC has installed an additional 25 containers in various sub-counties, bringing the total number of containers to 642, up from 617 used last year.” KNEC CEO affirmed.

Security during the Exam time

On exam security, Njengere stressed that KNEC will reduce the visible involvement of officers in junior-level assessments to create a more normal environment.

“During the administration of KJSEA and KPSEA, security officers will be engaged only where it is necessary to ensure that these assessments are administered in a normal and conducive environment for these candidates. In this regard, they will only be engaged in the distribution of examination materials to examination centres and the return of candidates’ answer sheets and scripts to the container in a few areas that have security challenges. However, during the KCSE examination, there should be at least two (2) security officers in every examination centre.” KNEC CEO added

CS Ogamba emphasised the collective responsibility of all players in ensuring credible exams. “Jointly, we have to ensure that the administration of examinations and assessments strictly adheres to the established rules and regulations to safeguard the credibility of the entire process. Our collective efforts are necessary because of the high numbers and countrywide spread of the examination and assessment centres,” Ogamba said.

With the exams just weeks away, the Ministry of Education and KNEC are urging all stakeholders to prepare fully, as the country gears up to test more than 3.4 million learners.