Parents and candidates will wait longer than usual to access the 2023 KCSE results released today after scrapping of the SMS service.
According to Education Cabinet Secretary Ezekiel Machogu, the government has no service provider and didn’t want to inconvenience various stakeholders after the SMS service failed during the release of KCPE results last November.
Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang last year announced the abolishment of the SMS system, citing plans to introduce a more efficient and cost-free system for accessing results.
Before the National Assembly Education Committee on Basic Education, Dr Kipsang emphasised the development of a system that would be accessible to candidates without charges.
‘‘We are building systems which will be dependent on our resources that will be available to our candidates free of charge,’’ he said.
However, the limited access to internet in many households poses a challenge for parents and candidates, forcing some to resort to the more expensive cyber cafes.
Reports indicate long queues forming at these facilities while others prefer to wait until the results are available in schools, the latter taking days and coming with anxiety.
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President William Ruto has been an advocate of technological advancement, especially the promotion of the e-Citizen service. Indeed, for a country with an ICT and Digital Economy ministry, it will be difficult for the government to explain the SMS hitch for a key service delivery as the release of a national exam.
As part of the government’s efforts to digitise services, more than 5,000 government functions can now be accessed through the e-Citizen platform under a single paybill number: 222222.
How to check 2023 KCSE
To check the 2023 KCSE results, candidates can visit the Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) website and use their registration details.
Mr Machogu assured that the online results access would be of efficient.
“This time we have worked with engineers and experts and we are sure that the website is working, and Kenyans will not have inconveniences we had last time,” he said.
A new grading system was introduced for the 2023 KCSE where two, instead of five, mandatory subjects–Mathematics and one language (English, Kiswahili, or Kenyan Sign Language)– has been used to calculate the mean grade.
Examiners selected the five best-performed subjects per candidate, eliminating the previous requirement of five mandatory subjects across three clusters.
