On 30th January 2026 while driving home from my rural hospital, I offered a lift to a teacher from a Senior Secondary School (SSS)—the new name under the Competency-Based Education (CBE) system, formerly CBC, which replaced Kenya’s 8-4-4 system.
From the very beginning, the transition to CBC raised serious concerns among parents and teachers. The process appeared rushed, lacked adequate public participation, and—most critically—had an unclear endgame. There were legitimate fears that the system would shift the cost of education from the State to parents. The government marketed CBC as a system with no exams and no failure, in contrast to 8-4-4. Notably, then Cabinet Secretary for Education, Amina Mohamed, publicly expressed reservations and placed the rollout on hold. Soon after, she was transferred to another ministry. The message was clear: the system would proceed, concerns notwithstanding.
At the time, I was serving as Chairperson of a Parents–Teachers Association. We engaged in intense debates with our school principal, who herself had experienced the earlier 7-6-3 system before 8-4-4. Her view was balanced: CBC could work—but only with substantial investment in teacher training, infrastructure, and preparation. In her private school, such investments were made. Unfortunately, most public schools lacked this leadership capacity and resources. Teachers were abruptly thrust into CBC, yet expected to implement it using the old 8-4-4 mindset and tools.
A Conversation That Reveals the Cracks
“Why are you getting home so late?” I asked the SSS teacher.
“We had a parents’ academic clinic for Form Three,” she replied.
An academic clinic, she explained, is essentially a parents–teachers meeting where parents receive progress reports from all subject teachers.
I asked about class sizes.
“My class has 50 students, with six streams in Form Three.”
That sounded overwhelming. She corrected me.
“Those are actually fewer. The newer SSS cohorts are even larger.”
When I asked about students transitioning from Junior Secondary School (JSS), she sighed.
“There is a lot of confusion. We’ve received about 600 new JSS students. There’s a directive that all must be admitted—uniform or fees or not. Capitation hasn’t been released. Textbooks haven’t arrived; we’re told they’ll come in two weeks. So we have many idle students, especially boys, just eating and waiting.”
How, then, do schools cope?
“Schools increase fees. Boarding schools can manage that. Day schools cannot.”
Pathways Without Guidance
I asked about the CBC pathways.
She noted that many students are unable to explain which pathway they are on. SSS teachers are now forced to re-explain concepts that should have been covered in JSS. She also observed—half-jokingly—that many students were placed in the STEM pathway and wondered whether Kenya was planning to produce only doctors.
More seriously, she raised a fundamental flaw: once a student selects a pathway, failure later offers little room for adjustment. Under 8-4-4, students still had subject clusters even if performance was uneven. CBC, as currently implemented, risks locking students into early decisions with lifelong consequences.
There are three official pathways:
• STEM
• Arts and Sports Science
• Social Sciences
Schools are categorised as:
• C1 – National
• C2 – Provincial
• C3 – Sub-County
Each school is expected to offer at least two pathways; some may offer all three.
The Myth of “No Exams”
“I thought CBC had no exams,” I told her.
She laughed.
“KEPSEA is an exam. It determines which school a student joins. Points still exist. To get into a C1 school like Alliance High School, you need around 80 points. Our school admits students with about 60 points.”
The language may have changed—‘Exceeding Expectations’—but the reality has not. Points still decide everything.
As we drove past a group of students leaving school at around 6 p.m., she remarked, “Those are 8-4-4 students. CBC students must be released by 3:20 p.m.”
Three Uncomfortable Conclusions
From this conversation, three conclusions are unavoidable:
1. Kenya’s education system is in crisis.
Political interference has undermined sound planning. CBC was designed and rolled out without sufficient involvement of key stakeholders—especially teachers. While the system might eventually work, early cohorts are paying the price of experimentation.
2. Universities will be forced to set their own entrance exams.
Vague descriptors such as ‘Exceeding Expectations’ cannot reliably differentiate candidates for higher education.
3. Public resignation has set in.
When Kenyans feel powerless, they slip into fait accompli mode—accepting decisions imposed upon them, even when the risks are obvious. CBC was questioned, warned against, and protested. Yet it was pushed through regardless.
A Call to Action: Pause, Listen, Fix
Kenya is not short of ideas, expertise, or goodwill. What we lack is the political humility to pause, listen, and correct course.
The transition from JSS to SSS has exposed deep structural weaknesses in the Competency-Based Education system—weaknesses that can no longer be dismissed as “teething problems.” The evidence is now in our classrooms: overcrowding, confused learners, unprepared teachers, delayed capitation, missing textbooks, and parents being forced to shoulder costs that the State promised to absorb.
The Government must immediately take the following steps:
1. Declare a transitional pause on the JSS–SSS rollout, not to abandon CBC, but to audit it honestly. Independent education experts, teachers’ unions, school heads, parents, and learners must be meaningfully involved.
2. Release capitation funds on time and in full, and ensure learning materials are available before learners are admitted—not weeks later.
3. Clarify pathways and allow flexibility. Learners must not be locked into irreversible academic tracks at such a young age. There must be clear mechanisms for transition between pathways without penalty.
4. Invest seriously in teacher training and staffing, especially in public schools. No education reform can succeed if teachers are treated as an afterthought.
5. Communicate honestly with Kenyans. If assessments, points, and competitive placement still exist, let us stop pretending otherwise. Truth builds trust; slogans do not.
Education reforms should be about children, not politics, not legacy projects, and not ideological stubbornness. If we fail to act now, we risk sacrificing an entire generation on the altar of a poorly executed experiment. This is the moment for courage, not defensiveness. A system that cannot listen cannot teach.
Dr Simon Kigondu is an obstetrician gynaecologist and a parent concerned about education of our children