Only 10 counties had higher number of male candidates than females in the just released KCPE, according to Education CS Ezekiel Machogu.
Releasing the results, Machogu said that there were 1,406,557 candidates who sat the KCPE examination this year in 28,533 examination centres across the country.
The 10 counties with the higher male:female ratio were Mandera (62.77 per cent: 37.23 per cent), Garissa (61.47 per cent: 38.53 per cent) Turkana (57.00 per cent: 43.00 per cent), and Wajir (56.91 per cent: 43.09 per cent).
Others were Machakos (52.79 per cent: 47.21 per cent), Nyamira (52.40 per cent: 47.60 per cent), Samburu (52.39 per cent: 47.61 per cent), Baringo (52.13 per cent: 47.87 per cent), Nandi (52.05 per cent: 47.95 per cent), and Makueni (52.03 per cent: 47.97 per cent) counties.
Only Isiolo (48.25 per cent: 51.75 per cent) county recorded a significant entry of more female than male candidates.
The counties which had the highest percentages of candidates who were 12 years and below were: Baringo (7.30 per cent), Wajir (6.37 per cent), Bomet (5.99 per cent), Kericho (5.82 per cent) and West Pokot (5.57 per cent).
The highest number of candidates in the appropriate age bracket 13-15 years was 1,023,859, translating to 72.31 per cent, a trend that Machogu said has been observed over the last five years.
The counties which had the highest percentages of candidates who were 18 years and above were Garissa(25.86 per cent), Turkana (24.50 per cent), Kwale (16.09 per cent), Kilifi (15.66 per cent) and Mandera (33.90 per cent).
Machogu observed that since 1985 when KCPE was incepted, a total of 26,067,181 candidates have been examined for the KCPE examination.
“I am happy to report that the 8-4-4 period has recorded an improvement on achieving the gender parity in the education sector,” said Machogu.
According to Machogu, in 1985, the country had a low gender parity favouring male at 59.2 per cent and female at 40.8 per cent.
He added that in the 2023 KCPE examination, the gender parity slightly shifted in favour of male at 51.30 per cent and female at 48.70 per cent.
Of these, there were 721,544 male and 685,017 female candidates. A total of 205 candidates who were not registered were allowed to sit the examination (125 male and 80 female).
By Education News reporter
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