Education Cabinet secretary George Magoha has cautioned parents against putting ‘high and stupid’ pressure on their children ahead of national exams.
“There should not be such high pressure on the child, can parents stop putting high and very stupid pressure on their children. Accept our children the way God has given them to us,” said Magoha.
Speaking during an update on the preparation for KCSE and KCPE exams at the Kenya School of Monetary Studies, the CS asked parents not to push their children to suicide over results.
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“We can’t be the same. If God gives me a child who can give me a D+, I should thank him for it and not make them go and commit suicide,” he continued.
“Stop giving children targets which are irrational because we don’t want an exam like they used to have 4 years ago where everybody has an A and they don’t know anything,” he added.
Magoha went ahead to assure the candidates that each of them will move to the next stage regardless of their performance.
“I want to assure our children from wherever they are, perhaps they are taking the exams too seriously, it just an examination and everybody will move to the next stage.”
National exams have been treated as a matter of life and death for some parents who punish their children severely for failing to achieve certain targets.
In November 2018, a girl was beaten to death by her parents in Bungoma county after poor performance in KCPE exams.
The irate parents are said to have landed on their daughter for scoring 277 marks in the national exams.
In another incident, a KCSE candidate from Kajiado County committed suicide in December 2018 for failing to score an A.