Ranking best performing schools in national exams is not allowed by the Kenya National Examination Council. It is believed that the pressure to be the best pushed some schools to cheating in exams.
But that does not mean that we can’t get the statistics. And three days since the results were released by Education CS Amina Mohammed, we can now reveal the best performing school nationally.
But can you guess who emerged tops? Well it is a very unlikely name.
A very little known school in a remote village in Ukambani overcame all odds to emerge the top school nationally. Ikombe Day and Boarding Primary School in Yatta Constituency Machakos County was the top ranked school with a mean score of 418.6 marks.
“Last year, we were ranked number three in the category of best performing public schools, but this year, we beat them all. We are grateful, our labour paid off, this is God’s doing,” said the school’s head teacher, Mr Munya Mbondo. Of the school’s 95 candidates, only one did not score 400 marks and above.
The best pupil at the school was Rita Mwelu, who scored 441 marks. The top boy scored 439 marks while the last candidate scored 399 marks.
Mr Mbondo told local media that the performance was balanced across both genders, with the poorly performed subject being social studies at 77.44 points. The best performed subject was mathematics, with a mean of 91.2 marks.
But how did they achieve this?
Teachers and candidates attributed the incredible performance to discipline, hard work and the fear of God. “The biggest motivation for all of us has been our steady improvement over the years. Teachers set their targets per subject and the students set theirs, then we all meet and agree on a target. This is a project that we start engaging in from Standard One but it is taken seriously in Standard Six,” said the head teacher.
The teachers are also motivated by the school’s alumni who, once in a while, take them for trips locally, and within East Africa, after they record improved performance. This time, they have been promised air tickets to Mombasa for their incredible performance.
From dailyactive, we say congratulations to Ikombe Primary School