Knec Says Transition Report will Replace KCPE Certificates at CBC’s Grade 6 Level
Transition Report To Replace Certificates in CBC’s Grade 6 graduation
The Kenya National Examinations Council is a regulatory body vested with the responsibility of administering, regulating and awarding scores and certificates for learners at different levels of education in Kenya.
One of the examinations administered by Knec at the end of primary school level is the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education, KCPE that marks transition from primary to secondary schools.
Following the roll out of the new Competence-Based Curriculum, CBC, the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education, KCPE national exams will be replaced by a combination of both progressive and summative Competence Based Assessment, CBA Tests.
Henceforth, learners who complete Grade Six under the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) next year will receive a transition report rather than the exam certificate that has been issued to primary school graduates since 1985.
The results of this report will be used to place students in junior secondary school, which is one of the changes recommended by the Task Force on Enhancing Access, Relevance, Transition, Equity, and Quality for Effective Curriculum Reforms Implementation.
The transition report will include the results of learners’ assessments at the end of Grades Four, Five, and Six, as well as the results of a national summative assessment. The first of these assessments will be given in November of next year.
According to the report, at the end of Grade Six, the formative (classroom and school-based) assessment outcomes that will have been submitted to the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec) will be combined with the national summative assessment outcomes to prepare a Transitional Report (TR) for each individual learner.
Grade Five students have already completed their Grade Four school-based assessment. They are currently completing practical and project-based assessments alongside their Grade Four peers. The deadline is December 10th.
From January 31 to February 4, they will be evaluated on theory. Their grades in Grades Four, Five, and Six will be graded out of a possible twenty percent. Teachers will administer and grade these assessments, and the results will be recorded in the school year report, which will be uploaded to the Knec portal.
According to the report, Knec should develop robust ICT systems to support processes related to competency-based assessment, such as “enrolment and tracking of learners throughout the education cycle, item banking and access to assessment tools, and maintaining a database of learners’ performance.”
These are the scores that will be added to the results of the summative assessment, which will be graded out of 40. The report also states that the summative assessment at the end of Grade Six will only cover what the students learned in Grades Four, Five, and Six.
“The assessment will… provide basis for early identification and nurturing of individual talents and areas of interest and finally inform policy on required interventions,” the report reads.
Knec piloted the Grade Six summative assessment in 212 schools in September, but used Grade Five students because there is no candidate class at the moment. The assessment used a multiple-choice format, as opposed to other CBC school-based assessments, which use projects and oral tests to assess students.
