The recent expose dubbed
'Certificate of Doom' by Kenya's NTV television channel was a commendable
piece. That is why we need to encourage members of the fourth estate to keep unraveling the truths on academic fraud and impropriety in Kenya. The truth must
be told if we truly care about building and nurturing a society with academic
competency and respect through integrity.
Now that the cat is out of the
bag on academic fraud, the Ministry of Education, Kenya National Examination
Council (KNEC) and Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) must be put
on the spotlight because they are tasked to ensure quality education and
effective testing procedures for all learners in the country.
First of all, does the Ministry
of Education conduct thorough vetting of all tertiary institutions to ensure
that they conform to learning standards like: presence of qualified
instructors, upholding entry grades of students based on the courses they take,
the institutions’ affiliations to examination testing bodies at home and abroad
and the suitability of the learning environments? It is pathetic that many
public and private learning institutions in Kenya have lost their credibility
either because of being commercialized, lack of integrity during registration,
learning and testing or operating in an environment not equipped with the right
facilities.
With modern technology, to
start a proprietary institution, you only require two rooms, five desktop
computers and a receptionist to open a computer college on Tom Mboya Street.
Many parents from upcountry who are unfamiliar with what goes on in our urban
centres are often duped to enroll their children in such fake institutions.
These fake institutions can be found in Nairobi and other Kenyan small towns
like Kisii, Embu, Voi, Eldoret etc. They lack operating credentials from the
Ministry of Education and perhaps the only validation they have is a license
from the municipalities in which they operate.
With the mushrooming of
malpractices in professional and career development, we cannot blame the
operators who want to make quick bucks or the end user students but the
Ministry of Education which is tasked with regulating the standards of learning
and testing in the country. The recent revelation by Dennis Okari of NTV about
malpractices in the education sector puts the efficiency of the Ministry of
education, KNEC and KICD on the line.
In the academic world, higher
learning institutions like the University of Nairobi enjoy the power of setting
up curriculum standards and study modules for students through the department
of higher education.
However, tertiary institutions must operate under strict
curriculum disciplines provided by the Ministry of Education. In the NTV
expose, I was shocked to see Nairobi Aviation College granting a diploma
certificate in aeronautical engineering. I just wondered which examining body
provided the final testing for the award of such diploma, which was on the
college’s logo. Besides, I just wonder how a company like Kenya Airways can
hire an Aerospace technician diploma holder from an institution with no
capacity to train or even test their students in such a sensitive course.
It is only a desperate employer who would accept a diploma
certificate bearing a tertiary College logo on it transcripts. It can also be
noted that, tertiary institutions often offer internal courses like basic
computer literacy, computer repair, communication, math tutoring etc whose
certificates are often printed in the institution’s logos and this is
acceptable, but not high calibre courses like aeronautical engineering.
Just like the Kenya Bureau of
standards (KBS) and Pharmacy and Poisons Board (KPPB) which ensures the quality,
potency, and validity of goods, chemicals and medicines manufactured or
imported into the country, the Ministry of Education should ensure that,
knowledge imparted into Kenyans’ brains is up to standard and can conform
to competency in human capital in the labour market.
To avoid cheating through
impersonation, KNEC, which is the umbrella testing body in the Country together
with other bodies like KASNEB needs to ensure that the exams are proctored with
the strictness it deserves. Since the institutions registered by the Ministry
of Education offering KNEC and KASNEB exams are known, it’s their responsibility
to safeguard integrity during testing. It must be remembered that foreign
testing bodies like The Institute of Commercial Management (ICM), City and
Guilds International (CGI), Association of Business executives (ABE) etc, rely
on KNEC to ensure that integrity is maintained during testing. There are many
Kenyan students who study the curriculum of the said colleges locally.
Just like in government,
corruption has permeated in the education field. The old trend where children
of the rich excelled academically is now reciprocal. When children from poor
families are toiling and moiling to acquire college education, those from rich
families register and attend few classes and in less than 48 months, they are
in the arena marching in academic gowns ready to be awarded with degrees and
diplomas. Your guess is as good as mine on how they compromised their way up
due to their financial muscles. The end result is total incompetency in the job
market.
I’m not against the mushrooming
of proprietary and tertiary institutions because they benefit students who do
not qualify to join national universities to achieve professional careers. My
problem with these institutions is their failure to follow standard practices
to ensure quality in their training.
Academic integrity is the first
impression on how an individual is likely to behave in their professional life.
A student who participates in plagiarism or cheating is likely to carry the
same trend to the job market. A lecturer who rewards a student because of money
or sexual favours is as worse as a physician who knowingly gives wrong
medication to his patients. Such lecturers destroy not only the student but all
individuals who will seek the services of the student in professional life.
We must remember that, a well-educated
society will lead to accelerated socio-economic development, a boost in
efficiency, effective service delivery in the public and private sectors. One
common reality is that, even with increased number of Universities and tertiary
colleges in Kenya, challenges in the education sector continue to spiral since
we transitioned from the 7-4-2-3 to 8-4-4 system of education in 1985. It
is therefore prudent that the education policy makers review our education
system to make it conform to the challenges of the modern century.
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