Determinants Of Transition Rate Improvement For Girls From Primary Schools To Secondary Schools In Kuria West, Migori County, Kenya

ABSTRACT Transition rate of students from primary school to secondary is very fundamental it is important because Africa has the challenges of low education transition rate from the primary level to secondary school level. The governments operate with huge budgetary deficits which always need to be plugged by way of donors infusing budgetary and development support. This leaves the challenge of financing the girl-child education programmes especially for the post-primary education programmes to the household and the communities. As such, their chances of staying in school for girl-child reduce. The general objective of this study was to establish strategies to improve transition rate to secondary schools for girls in primary schools in Kuria West Sub County. The study targeted 31 secondary school principals and 5 education officers in Kuria West Sub County. The study targeted all the 31 secondary school principals, 350 teachers, all the 5 education officers in Kuria West Sub County. The study also targeted parents of primary going children totaling 19,024 and also girls who dropped in class eight and never proceeded to secondary school who are about 4,000 to give in-depth information on transition rate of pupils in primary schools in Kenya. The sample size used was as follows: 5 education officers out of a population of 5, 10 principals out of a population of 31, 40 class 8 dropouts from a population of 400 and 38 parents out of a population of 19024. The schools for the study were selected using simple random sampling. Classes 8 drop out girls were selected using purposive sampling. The principals and parents were selected using simple random sampling while census was conducted for education officers as their population is small. The main instruments that were employed in primary data collection were questionnaires and interview guides. The questionnaires were administered to principals and education officers while interview guide was used for class 8 drop out girls who never proceeded to secondary schools. The research generated both qualitative and quantitative data. The qualitative data was analyzed thematically by the research questions while quantitative data was descriptively analyzed. The study results showed that costs reduction, school infrastructure, quality of education and advocacy and awareness campaigns are factors that have a great influence on transition rate of girls from primary schools to secondary schools. The study concludes that school fees were found to be the main reason why most students are not in school. Similarly there are shortages of school spaces, as well as uneven distribution of schools thus difficulties of access and the main quality issues which affect school attendance are related to inadequacies in teacher quality as well as the quality of teaching and learning experience for children in schools. The study recommends that government should initiate a secondary school education fund to be sponsored by companies and individuals and the government should also put in place poverty reduction measures in the sub-county to cater for needy students.