EDITORIAL: Uniforms will soon become a hurdle to school affordability

Hundreds of thousands of parents have this week sent their sons and daughters into Grade 10 in the new CBC programme.

A majority have reported the shock of having to buy overpriced uniforms sold by schools.

One of the most enduring refrains in every Kenyan conversation is the cost of education. It gets worse in January because of the costly transitions between primary and secondary school.

The Kenyan market is mature enough to provide every shade of every colour that forms a school’s uniform.

School administrators have, in the now notorious Kenyan style, found a safe avenue for exploiting parents because so many other illegal money-making avenues seem to have been clamped down by circulars from the Ministry of Education bureaucrats.

Schools should let parents, so long as they have been provided the specifications, buy uniforms that they can afford.

Uniforms will, at this rate, become one of the silent hurdles that create a barrier to school affordability.

The case would have been different if the schools sold the uniform at a lower or subsidised price.

In any case, we must ask ourselves whether school uniforms serve a purpose that outweighs the cost.

The Cabinet Secretary must weigh in and decide whether schools should also be licensed as uniform merchants.

Quote of the day: “If everyone were clothed with integrity, if every heart were just, frank, kindly, the other virtues would be well-nigh useless.” —French playwright Moliere was baptised on January 15, 1622