Why 50:30:20 school capitaion model is coming to an end

The government could soon scrap the long-standing 50:30:20 funding formula for schools and will now tie disbursements directly to revenue collection in a bid to end the perennial cash crunch that has crippled learning. 

Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba said the old formula, which saw schools receive 50 per cent of their funds in the first term, 30 per cent in the second, and 20 percent in the third, is unworkable because the school calendar was constantly out of step with the national financial year.

In an interview with The Standard, the CS said the new revenue-linked model will ensure schools only plan around money that has actually been collected by Kenya Revenue Authority, not promises. 

According to Ogamba, this change will iron out the chronic delays that have forced heads to ration meals, suspend some operations or send children home.

“Challenges in disbursements have been occasioned by conflicting timelines between the school calendar and the financial year. We are re-engineering the disbursement of funds so that releases align with actual revenue collection,” Ogamba said.

The proposed changes come at a time, the funding of schools has been a major point of concern with revelations that the government has not been releasing the full capitation amount to schools.

In July, Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi revealed that the government has only been releasing an average of Sh16,900 each year as capitation despite the full allocation set at Sh22,244.

And the CS now says that the government is considering consolidating all scholarships into one pool to secure additional funds for primary and secondary schools, as recommended by the Presidential Working Party on Education Reforms. 

Ogamba said Cabinet and parliamentary approvals are being sought to back the legal and policy changes needed to strengthen capitation at the basic education level. 

“That is the only way Competency Based Education (CBE) will succeed, complete classrooms, equip labs, strengthen digital infrastructure and cover the actual cost of delivery,” he said.

The shift in funding comes at a time when ODM leader Raila Odinga has renewed calls to devolve education, a proposal that Ogamba has rejected. 

He warned that transferring responsibility to counties would entrench inequality, since some devolved units have failed to demonstrate prudent use of public resources. 

Ogamba argues that national management of education guarantees uniformity in learner entitlements and maintains consistency in teacher deployment, curriculum delivery and examinations.

“We are not going to experiment with the lives of our children. If each county sets its own capitation and hiring policies, you will have forty-seven different standards. That is not education, that is chaos,” he said

The Cabinet Secretary said preparations for the Kenya Junior Secondary Education Assessment scheduled for October and November are at an advanced stage. 

Learners in Grade 9 will carry 40 per cent of their scores from continuous assessment conducted between Grades 6 and 8, while the national exam will account for the remaining 60 per cent.

He assured parents that circulars have been issued, teachers have been trained, piloting has been completed and funds for exam processing have already been released to avert any last-minute demands on parents.

“The balance of Sh6 billion has already been released. Parents will not be forced to pay,” he said.

To accommodate the transition of learners into senior school pathways, the ministry is also racing to address infrastructural gaps. 

Ogamba disclosed that 1,600 laboratories will be built before December in institutions that do not have them. Procurement is set to begin early next month, with completion targeted within two months. 

He added that data collected from learner preferences showed about 5,000 schools did not attract a single career pathway choice, a finding that has triggered a review of whether some schools should be merged or repurposed.

Concerns have also been raised about teacher preparedness for new subjects introduced under CBE. 

Ogamba was quick to stress that retraining is not about forcing teachers into unfamiliar disciplines but about equipping them to apply new methods within their areas of competence.

“Once a teacher, always a teacher. We are not taking a history teacher and forcing them into chemistry. Retooling builds on subject foundations and CBE pedagogy,” he said. 

On higher education, Ogamba said the number of technically insolvent public universities has dropped from the previous 23 to 14 after the introduction of student-centred funding. 

However, he admitted that the sector still faces deep structural challenges, ranging from ballooning debts to skewed staffing.

He criticised institutions where the ratio of academic to non-academic staff has been reversed, with clerks and casuals outnumbering lecturers.

 “Policy requires 70 per cent academic staff and 30 per cent non-academic.

‘‘In most institutions the ratio is reversed. That is unsustainable,” he said.