Why Parents Are Quietly Moving Their Children from Private Schools to Public Junior Schools After KPSEA
It has emerged that many parents who enrolled their children in private primary schools are transferring them to public junior schools once the Kenya Primary School Education Assessment (KPSEA) is over.
The trend is visible across many private schools in the country. Learners who spent years in private institutions from Grade 1 to Grade 6 are packing up and heading to public schools just as they prepare to join Grade 7.
For a system that was designed to give learners a smooth, continuous journey through basic education, the pattern raises serious questions about where parents now place their confidence.
A busy examination season
The movement comes at a time when the national examination calendar is about to get very busy. KPSEA and KJSEA candidates will go through their rehearsals on Friday 23rd October 2026, and the real assessments begin on Monday 26th October. KPSEA runs until 28th October, while KJSEA continues until 30th October.
In total, about 3.4 million learners are expected to sit national exams and assessments this season. These are 1,303,913 in KPSEA, 1,145,585 in KJSEA and 996,078 in KCSE.
To manage an exercise of this size, the Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) has contracted 342,005 professionals, including centre managers, supervisors, invigilators and script markers.
Reports, not certificates
The shift in parental behaviour is partly explained by how the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) treats the end of each stage.
Under the old 8.4.4 system, the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) was a high-stakes event.
Candidates were issued with a certificate, and the results largely determined which secondary school they would join.
CBC works differently. After KPSEA at the end of Grade 6, learners are issued with a report, not a certificate.
The same applies after the Grade 9 assessment, KJSEA, where learners again receive a report.
A certificate, the Kenya Certificate of Basic Education (KCBE), is only issued after learners sit their final assessment in Grade 12. That certificate signals the end of mandatory basic education.
This means KPSEA is not the gateway it once was. It does not close a chapter in the way KCPE did, and it is no longer the point at which a child graduates from primary school with a certificate in hand.
Learners move on to Grade 7 as part of the same continuous basic education pathway, which makes the end of Grade 6 a natural point for parents to reconsider where their child should study.
A break from the 8.4.4 habit
During the 8.4.4 era, many parents who started their children in private schools allowed them to stay until Class 8.
Children would sit KCPE in the same school and only change institutions when they transitioned to secondary school.
Staying put was the norm, and private schools counted on that loyalty to keep their upper primary classes full.
Under CBC, junior school is a secondary-level stage. For many parents, that has changed the calculation.
Once KPSEA is done, they ask whether the school that served their child well in primary can handle the demands of Grades 7, 8 and 9.
Increasingly, the answer they arrive at is no, and they look to public junior schools instead. Several reasons explain this shift.
1. Public junior schools have better-qualified teachers
The first and most important reason is staffing. Public junior schools are generally better staffed with quality teachers than most private ones.
Junior school is a secondary school level. In principle, only teachers qualified to teach at secondary level are equipped to handle Grades 7, 8 and 9.
That means diploma and graduate teachers. A recent research finding indicates that most private schools are unable to hire graduate teachers for the junior school level.
The reason is cost. Many private schools, especially the smaller and mid-sized ones, cannot afford to recruit and pay secondary school teachers.
Instead, a majority of them rely on P1 teachers, who are trained primary school teachers, to handle junior school classes.
In many private schools, it is PTE teachers who have been assigned to Grades 7, 8 and 9. These teachers may be hardworking and committed, but they were not trained for secondary-level content, and parents are increasingly aware of the gap.
The public sector, by contrast, has been recruiting. Speaking to teachers at Kasarani during World Teachers’ Day, President William Ruto said about 100,000 teachers have been hired and that 20,000 others will be hired by the end of the year, bringing the total to 120,000.
Most of these teachers are deployed in junior schools. He also said 220,000 teachers have been retooled for the Competency Based Education (CBE) framework, and that Sh952 million has been budgeted for further capacity development.
Training in public schools is ongoing, and public school teachers are therefore more conversant with the new curriculum.
Private school teachers, who often do not benefit from the same structured retooling, can find themselves at a disadvantage when delivering a curriculum that is still maturing.
2. Public junior schools are better equipped
The second factor is facilities. Junior school learners need more than a classroom and a blackboard. The curriculum places emphasis on practical learning, science, technology and projects, and these require laboratories, learning materials and space.
Many private schools are still struggling with the basics, including adequate classrooms, laboratories and teaching and learning resources.
Building and equipping a science laboratory is expensive, and many of them have simply not been able to do it. Some are operating on small plots that cannot even support a playing field.
Public junior schools, on the other hand, have benefited from heavy government investment. In his address to teachers, President Ruto noted that, working with the National Government Constituencies Development Fund, the Government has built more than 23,000 classrooms and is equipping 1,600 laboratories to support science and the new Senior School pathways.
For a parent comparing the two options, the difference can be striking. A public school may offer laboratories, large compounds and playing fields, while a private school nearby may lack key facilities for learning, including laboratories.
Parents who want their children to get a full junior school experience are drawn to the institution that can actually provide it.
3. Cost
The third reason is money. Private school fees are a heavy burden for many households, and the burden often grows as children move up the levels. Public junior schools are considerably cheaper.
In public schools, the government provides books free of charge. Teachers are qualified and paid by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC), and many teaching and learning resources are supplied by the government. Parents do not have to bear the full cost of the educational inputs their children need.
In private schools, the story is different. Parents have to pay for many things, including the construction of facilities such as the laboratories that are currently missing.
In effect, a parent may be asked to fund the school’s expansion into junior school while the quality of the teaching staff remains uncertain. When families compare what they pay with what they get, public schools look like better value.
With the cost of living remaining a concern for many households, a move to a public junior school can free up significant resources for other family needs, including feeding, transport and the future costs of senior school.
4. Distance from home
The fourth reason is proximity. Most public schools are located close to where parents live, which makes access easy.
Children can walk or take a short ride to school, and parents can easily reach the school when needed.
Many private schools, by contrast, are some distance away from the homes of the learners they serve. This brings additional stress and cost.
Parents must pay for school transport or spend time and money dropping and picking up their children. Long journeys leave children tired, reduce time for rest and study, and expose them to risks on the road.
For parents of children entering Grade 7, who are now adolescents and need more time for study and rest, a school close to home is an attractive option.
What this means for private schools
The movement of learners after KPSEA presents a real challenge for private schools. Many of them have built their business model on keeping learners from the earliest grades through to the end of primary.
If a significant number of learners leave at the end of Grade 6, enrolment in junior school classes falls, and the schools lose fee income they had planned for.
Some private schools, particularly the better-resourced ones, will be able to adapt by hiring graduate teachers, investing in laboratories and demonstrating that their junior school offering is of high quality.
Others may find it difficult to survive without those investments, and some may decide to remain primary schools only.
For parents, the lesson is to ask the right questions before making a decision. Does the school have teachers qualified to teach at secondary level?
Does it have laboratories and other facilities? What will the total cost be over the three years of junior school?
How far is it from home? Answering these questions honestly will help families make the best choice for their children, whether that means staying where they are or moving to a public school.
Conclusion
As learners across the country prepare for KPSEA from 26th to 28th October and KJSEA from 26th to 30th October, many parents are already thinking about what comes next.
The trend of moving children from private schools to public junior schools after KPSEA reflects a practical reading of the new system.
With better-qualified teachers, stronger facilities, lower costs and shorter distances, public junior schools are increasingly convincing parents that they offer the better path through this stage of basic education.
The 8.4.4 habit of staying in one school until the end of Class 8 has given way to a more careful approach, in which parents treat the end of Grade 6 as a decision point.
Whether private schools respond by raising their standards or continue to lose learners at this stage will be one of the stories to watch as CBC matures.
