Ogamba: 85% of learners have transitioned from Grade 9 to Grade 10

Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba has said the government has overcome initial challenges in the transition of learners from Grade 9 to Grade 10, reporting that 85 per cent of eligible students have already reported to school.

Ogamba acknowledged that the shift to the new system presented logistical and administrative hurdles, but noted that education officials and school administrators were working to close the remaining gap.

“We have experienced some challenges in the transition from Grade 9 to Grade 10 since it is a new system, but we have managed to ensure that 85 per cent of the students who were expected to report have already done so,” he said.

Speaking on Tuesday on Citizen TV, the CS said efforts were ongoing to trace the remaining learners and ensure a full transition.

“The actual number of students who have enrolled is over 900,000. This does not include students who have reported in private schools, whose data we are still collecting, and those who are not transitioning. We anticipate that by the end of Wednesday, we will probably be over 90 per cent and hope to get to 100 per cent by the end of this week,” he said.

According to the CS, ministry field officers have been engaging county and sub-county education teams to address timetabling, placement and infrastructure requirements linked to the reforms.

The transition from Grade 9 to Grade 10 marks a key phase in the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) rollout, which restructures upper secondary pathways into academic, technical and vocational tracks.

The government has maintained that a 100 per cent transition rate remains a core target of the reforms.

Ogamba attributed the rapid progress to targeted government interventions, including door-to-door mop-up exercises led by chiefs and other National Government Administrative Officers (NGAOs).

“We are taking decisive steps to ensure that every eligible learner moves seamlessly from Grade 9 to Grade 10. Our vision is to create an education system where all students, regardless of their background, have equal opportunities to succeed,” he said during an interview on Capital FM on Tuesday morning.

A progress report compiled by NGAOs and county directors of education and released on Sunday, January 18, showed that by the close of the initial reporting deadline of January 16, only 61 per cent of the pioneer Competency-Based Education (CBE) cohort had transitioned to senior secondary schools.

At the time, about 440,000 KJSEA graduates remained out of school—a figure the government described as untenable as it pushes for a 100 per cent transition rate across all levels of learning.

The report attributed the slow uptake to a mix of factors, including financial constraints, isolated cases of early pregnancy, learner absenteeism or reluctance, and placement delays linked to families seeking alternative schools.

In response, the Ministry of Education extended the reporting deadline to Wednesday, January 21, and adopted a whole-of-society approach to trace and re-engage learners.

This included activating bursary and sponsorship interventions to support families facing financial difficulties.

Chiefs were directed to conduct door-to-door tracing and household mapping to identify learners who had not reported, while also convening community sensitisation forums through barazas, religious institutions and other local platforms to mobilise parents and guardians.