Principals have failed to accurately register their students in the National Education Management Information System (Nemis), leading to a cash crisis in schools.
The Education ministry has, however, assured secondary school headteachers that any genuine issues in the system will be addressed.
REGISTERING
Speaking during the Kenya Secondary School Heads Association in Mombasa on Monday, Director for Secondary Education Paul Kibet said from September last year, the ministry sent messages that it will start using Nemis in disbursement of funds from January.
School managers were mandated to capture and register students in the system. But in January, the ministry faced a dilemma after realising some schools had not registered all their students.
“Yet we were supposed to pay off capitation. There were two options; we were to either, wait until we have all Form One students registered then release the funds, or pay for those who had registered all students,” he said.
Mr Kibet said some schools had declared themselves as primary and private, leading to problems. Strangely, some principals didn’t even know their Nemis numbers.
He said Nemis will be rolled out in primary schools next year.
Mr Kibet said in January, 3,000 secondary schools had issues with Nemis after principals failed to capture their students’ details accurately. Some headteachers had captured girls in boys’ secondary schools.
“About 8,773 schools are benefiting from Nemis. In the next disbursement, we will do a reconciliation between what we disbursed in January and what we will release in May,” he said.
Some schools, he added, had not even started registering their students.
OVERSTRETCHED
“There are schools who were underpaid in January. The beauty of Nemis is that we can reimburse and recover the funds. This system works well, but a number of us are not very keen on what happens in Nemis. We have given this job to cyber cafes or our computer teacher who register students in one form, leading to problems,” he warned.
He said it was the principals’ responsibility to feed information into Nemis. Mr Kibet gave an example of Kaimosi Girls High school principal who would have lacked capitation for 200 students but realised before it was too late.
He, however, said many headteachers have managed to register students.
“When we talk of stretched resources, we also know about the teachers. The shortage has not been caused by the 100 per cent student transition (from primary to secondary school), it has been there. It has only been compounded. But the Teachers Service Commission will tackle that issue,” said Mr Kibet.
On how to mitigate the problem of overstretched facilities, he urged the principals to embrace technology to address such challenges. “Let’s see how we can use technology as a tool of delivery of the curriculum in our institutions,” he said.