KCPE exams kick-off countrywide

The Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examinations began Tuesday morning across the country with more than 850,000 standard eight candidates writing their final primary school exam.

The exams will conclude on Thursday. A spot check by Citizen TV across the country revealed that most schools started their exams on the scheduled time despite heavy rains being experienced in most parts.

On Monday, the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) boss Joseph Kivilu said the exams will take place in 24,278 examination centers and the examination papers had already been sent to distribution centres.

KNEC has engaged more security officers to protect both exam materials and pupils as well as ensure the three-day task goes on smoothly without any skirmishes. This comes even after a high number of exam leakages this year’s KCSE were reported with police officers being linked to the leakage.

Kivilu dispelled fears of irregularities in the KCSE exam saying the council has improved the security to minimize cases of cheating in exams.

He alluded that fraudsters are using new technology, including WhatsApp messaging, to pass questions to students before they sit the actual papers. He, however, urged candidates to refrain from such as it will lead to cancellation of their exam if caught.

Several measures have been put in place to by the council to deal with technological intervention that has led to the spread of KCSE.

Dr. Kivilu identified Garissa, Kisii, Oyugis, Nyamira, Rongo and Eastleigh in Nairobi as areas notorious for cheating and to that effect increased the number of security officers from 2 to 6 per every examination center.

In Mombasa, 40 inmates at Shimo la Tewa Maximum prison are sitting the KCPE exam this morning.

The candidates began with rehearsals on Monday where they were briefed on how to go about the examinations.