Tenets and Shortcomings of School and Student Rankings Based on Academic Performance at Secondary Level National Examinations in Kenya

Abstract

Academic examinations and result rankings has been tipped as the culmination of education achievement by a student in the country. This is manifested through the certificates that are issued with different grades. However, despite having students that excel and those that fail, there still remains the critical issue of quality vis-à-vis the academic outcomes and ranking. It is based on this premise that this paper attempts to give an insight on the implications of ranking students nationally in examinations. This paper employs a desk review method, and endeavoured to answer the following questions: Has the academic system of ranking students nationally helped shape the career destiny of students? What have been the merits and demerits of academic rankings in the country? Has the academic ranking tradition enhanced equity in education quality in the country? What are some of the remedies to the identified bottlenecks in the academic ranking systems of students? The general findings include: one, there has been cases of massive disparity in terms of allocation of staff personnel, finances and infrastructure, that has enhanced social stratification in terms of national, extra county, county, sub county and private schools. Two, there has been the rise of examination malpractices such as cheating for excellence purposes, that has diluted the quality of curriculum delivery among teachers who are its custodians. This paper is thus of the view that, the Ministry of Education is on the right path in discarding academic rankings to enhance quality of curriculum delivery to its students, tapping and nurturing of students talents, and bringing up a holistic all round student to fit in society. This paper thus recommends that more research and inputs should be done on this education sector, more so, on the competency based curriculum to improve it even further, as it is the way to salvage our education standards.

Keywords

• academic rankings
• national examinations
• curriculum
• student
• performance
• grade