Kenya orders 1.1m tablets from China

[MOON Ki]

Reading the usual predictable negativo comments here is always somewhat amusing -the more kenya moves ahead the more they find grouses. Kenya already invest about 20% of it's GDP/tax on education.  Probably the best you can find in Africa.

A major problem with you is that 99% of what you write here consists of fantasy and manufactured "facts"; so the first thing we must always do is carry out checks to determine where the other 1% lies.    Can we have some reliable source to support red?

By the way, it is not enough to simply look at expenditure.     Keep in mind that quite a chunk of the money is going to salaries, and Kenya has a serious problem with absenteeism and the number of teachers who don't even understand what they are supposed to teach.

In the final analysis, what matters is not just how much is spent, but what the results are.   Presumably you read local papers and pat attention to information that is coming out of Kenya itself.   If so, you have probably seen things like this:

Almost half of the children in primary schools, including those in upper classes lack basic numeracy and literacy skills, which means that heavy investments that the government has recently made in education have not borne fruit.
...
The outcome of the annual survey is particularly significant because it points to the very little gain the country is making from the billions of shillings it has pumped into free primary education in the past six years.

http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/Corporate-News/Kenya-suffers-quality-of-education-setback/539550-904732-5ksk3cz/index.html

Of the kids that are going to get laptops:

It found out that only 33 per cent of children in class two can read a paragraph of their level.

Read all that carefully.   

Here is additional information:

2012 Economic Survey shows that approximately 30 per cent of primary school pupils fail to transit to secondary schools ... The 70 per cent who proceed to secondary education fail massively. On average, 60 per cent (approximately 200,000 students) of those sitting the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) examinations end up scoring below 49 per cent ( C-). This reduces their chance of getting a vacancy in higher education.

From the KCPE dropouts and KCSE failures, it implies that about 450,000 unemployable children drop out of the school system. Yet, the Kenya Vision 2030 is looking upon the education sector to deliver the necessary skills and build adequate human capital to achieve and sustain the country as a middle-income country.

http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/Corporate-News/High-school-dropout-rate-threatens-Vision-2030-goal-/-/539550/1692444/-/ydanikz/-/index.html

We are ranked top 40 in quality of education worldwide....while ranking 100 or about in most of the indicator.

Top 40 in the world, eh? Envied in SSA, Peru, and Latin America, right?   Even by your standards, this is extremely wild fantasy.   I'm not going to ask if you have any reliable sources to back it up, because that will mean chasing you around as you jump from one confused story to another and then end up with something completely different.    Instead, I will ask this: what do you get or hope to achieve when you dish up such results of  a riotous imagination?

[RV Pundit]

What data do you want when you are quoting every tom, dick and harry that google can help you "fact check". If you don't have facts and figures on your fingertips; then it very very hard to debate; coz I am going to be arguing with all sort of rubbish you can google as you scavenge for any negative information.

If you're looking for credible data - try for instance Global Competitive Index - by WEF. If you read there - kenya is ranked 30 (just 10 place out of OECD countries) in education system  - and rank really well on related areas - labour quality, innovation and the shebang.

[MOON Ki]

What data do you want when you are quoting every tom, dick and harry that google can help you "fact check". If you don't have facts and figures on your fingertips; then it very very hard to debate; coz I am going to be arguing with all sort of rubbish you can google as you scavenge for any negative information.

He, he, he ... That is a new angle.     But you still have not answered by question: what do you get or hope to achieve when you dish up such results of such a riotous imagination?

[RV Pundit]

I don't have to know exact figures and facts - but I know enough in my head about kenya to dish out facts and figures that are ballpark estimates. It is pain to argue with somebody who just rushes to google.

I know for a fact that quality of kenya education is very very good. It may seem crap to you but wait until you get to some of those latin america countries you're quoting or even down in TZ where the richest kid get the same level education with poorest kid in kenya.

He, he, he ... That is a new angle.     But you still have not answered by question: what do you get or hope to achieve when you dish up such results of such a riotous imagination?

[RV Pundit]

Okay here we go with mr google...kenya education system is ranked highly than my 40 ballpark...and this is not by accident..but by investment in teachers that kenya has done...most of primary teachers now are degree or diploma or even master level graduates. Fact is our education budget is huge! and it paid off because all these MNC setting up shops in Nairobi, the thriving service sector and fact that we are biggest non-mineral  well diversified and sophisticated economy in sub sahara african...cannot happen by chance..but on the backbone of well trained, savvy, English speaking and world class professional you can easily pick from street of Nairobi.

I only hope we invest (and we are starting to) as much in infrastructure.

Further, supporting this innovative potential is an educational system that gets relatively good marks for quality 30th as well as for on-the-job training at 31st.

Adding laptops...might see us move to top 20! The same level of education a kid in developed world (oecd) gets!

You probably think education in US (developed world) is all good/excellent - while in fact studies have shown most of Americans cannot write in English..their native language and some families have never had member of their family gone to high school leave alone college. It doesn't mean you won't get schools in kenya without desks or even worse in places like Northern Kenya..but on average Kenya is moving very very well in EDUCATION.

[RV Pundit]

http://reports.weforum.org/global-competitiveness-index/competitiveness-rankings/#series=EOSQ128

[MOON Ki]

What data do you want when you are quoting every tom, dick and harry that google can help you "fact check". If you don't have facts and figures on your fingertips; then it very very hard to debate; coz I am going to be arguing with all sort of rubbish you can google as you scavenge for any negative information.

If you're looking for credible data - try for instance Global Competitive Index - by WEF. If you read there - kenya is ranked 30 (just 10 place out of OECD countries) in education system  -
....
Okay here we go with mr google...kenya education system is ranked highly than my 40 ballpark...and this is not by accident..but by investment in teachers that kenya has done...most of primary teachers now are degree or diploma or even master level graduates.
Further, supporting this innovative potential is an educational system that gets relatively good marks for quality 30th

Really?  Are you sure?  As usual, you have not actually understood what you have read.     Pay careful attention to the following, because you are about to learn something useful on how to interpret the results of a survey.

Part of results and rankings are no more than surveys of perceptions, and local perceptions at that, i.e. how the citizens of a country feel about their country.   Read that carefully and absorb it.   OK, now read it again.     That means two things of such parts:

(1) As mere perceptions, they cannot be  taken as objective indicators of quality of whatever.

(2) Because they are localized, they must not be used to compare countries beyond "people in this country feel better than people in that country on X".

On education here are some specifics that you will find here (using the "drop menu"): http://reports.weforum.org/global-competitiveness-report-2015-2016/competitiveness-rankings/

(a) On 4.09, "quality of primary education", Kenya is at no. 84.   Note the survey question:

In your

(b) It is on "5.03. Efficiency enhancers: quality of education" that Kenya is at no. 36.  On that ranking, South Africa is at no. 138 out of 140, the "worst" of all African countries, except for Egypt at no. 139.

If one does, as you appear to be doing, make the absurd assumption that some external body has gone around measuring the quality of education in 140 countries and then compiled a ranking, then the strange conclusion is that SA  has a truly bad system.  Really? But nothing of such measuring took place.

The survey question was:

In your country, how well does the education system meet the needs of a competitive economy? (1 = not well at all; 7 = extremely well)

So the ranking does not tell us anything objective about Kenya's education system, whether as a whole or as an "efficiency enhancer".    Nor does it even begin to tell us how Kenya's system compares with that of another country.   What it tells us, is, for example, that in this regard Kenyans feel better about their system than South Africans do.     

All of the above is probably a bit subtle for you, but spend some brain time on it.    I can assure you that you will be rewarded.   Once you have got the point you should then reflect on things like this:

http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/Corporate-News/Kenya-suffers-quality-of-education-setback/539550-904732-5ksk3cz/index.html

[RV Pundit]

Here we go with metholodogy ;survey is the most common instrument used in the data you keep googling and pasting here. Heck majority of scientific studies and research are surveys!. It all depend on who you're surveying.. I don't need to go into details & question their metholody but will take any credible data from credible institution and WEF is for me credible.Until we have PISA like test that OECD countries get tested (a sample of kids again!)...I am afraid that is we have no other way to compare Kenya and US quality of education..which clearly ranks kenya in that report as 35.

[RV Pundit]

Infact after googling like you .The nearest you can find to PISA like testing in Africa that include kenya is Sacmeq test for reading and math skills..and kenya came second after Mauritus. Not too dismilar to WEF ranking.
http://resep.sun.ac.za/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Spaull-2012-SACMEQ-at-a-Glance-10-countries.pdf

Here in 2011- Kenya ranked second in Southern and Eastern Africa after Mauritus -in SACMEQ
http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Kenyan+pupils+top+in+Africa+/-/1056/1286490/-/view/printVersion/-/wta2f3/-/index.html

http://www.sacmeq.org/ReadingMathScores

[Kim Jong-Un's Pajama Pants]

People, even the educated, forget just how much work goes into getting educated at a basic level.  Exposure to technology is important.  But useless without a sound education.  The emphasis should be made that education is what they are trying to facilitate. 

The OECD report I mentioned earlier has a finding that I think is relevant to a place like Kenya as well, especially given the notion that these things will somehow create a level playing field.    What they found out is that even after everyone gets a computer and the "digital divide" is accounted for, the kids who were badly off to start with ("disadvantaged", "low socio-economic group", etc.) are no better off and that the gaps that existed before remain.    They conclude that

To reduce inequalities in the ability to benefit from digital tools, countries need to improve equity in education first.   Ensuring that every child attains a base level of proficiency in reading and mathemtics will do more to create  opportunities in a digital world than can be achieved by expanding or subsidising access to high tech devices and digital services.   

Yep.  It's a no-brainer that to benefit from any technology, the basic skills, literacy and numeracy have to be in place or NOT ignored at the very worst.  One could argue that these skills could be acquired by the use of technology - I know there are things like raz-kids and xtramath that kids here use to supplement what they are learning in the respective fields. 

I want to give these guys the benefit of the doubt - hopefully I don't sound delusional - and assume that they have something along those lines as part of the learning materials.  On that measure, I would say a lazy or otherwise useless teacher can narrow the gap somewhat in the relevant skills just by teaching the kids how to use these things - it comes down to what is on those devices.

Still I agree that it is true, and indeed confirmed by numerous studies among them the OECD one, that dumping computers and learning materials at kids cannot make up for the deficit of good teachers and learning environments.  You need a person, ideally a professional who understands child development, psychology, learning and cognition.

[RV Pundit]

We are not expert in teaching and education to deeply and technical question this. For me this is an investment that  Gok has given to every kid. They can use or misuse the tablet - I know the majority will find lots of ways to make teaching of kids more fun, more easier and in the end the quality of teaching will improve. Those kids will find lots of ways to use the tablet on their own. This 17-20B would have disappeared in NYS like scheme..but here are folks doing a decent amount of working wiring up schools, training 70,000 teachers, hiring 200 ICT officers, delivering 1.2m tablets, rolling out digital content and coordinating all this...and all we can do is to claim to be expert in pedagogy after reading one OECD report.

Yep.  It's a no-brainer that to benefit from any technology, the basic skills, literacy and numeracy have to be in place or NOT ignored at the very worst.  One could argue that these skills could be acquired by the use of technology - I know there are things like raz-kids and xtramath that kids here use to supplement what they are learning in the respective fields. 

I want to give these guys the benefit of the doubt - hopefully I don't sound delusional - and assume that they have something along those lines as part of the learning materials.  On that measure, I would say a lazy or otherwise useless teacher can narrow the gap somewhat in the relevant skills just by teaching the kids how to use these things - it comes down to what is on those devices.

Still I agree that it is true, and indeed confirmed by numerous studies among them the OECD one, that dumping computers and learning materials at kids cannot make up for the deficit of good teachers and learning environments.  You need a person, ideally a professional who understands child development, psychology, learning and cognition.

[MOON Ki]

Here we go with metholodogy ;survey is the most common instrument used in the data you keep googling and pasting here. It all depend on who you're surveying. I don't need to go into details & question their metholody but will take any credible data from credible institution and WEF is for me credible.Until we have PISA like test that OECD countries get tested (a sample of kids again!)...I am afraid that is we have no other way to compare Kenya and US quality of education..which clearly ranks kenya in that report as 35.

As I said at the start:  Pay careful attention to the following, because you are about to learn something useful on how to interpret the results of a survey.

A hint again for you: It is not just the fact of the survey, but what it consists of and how the results are interpreted.   (I wrote that "part of results and rankings are no more than surveys of perceptions, and local perceptions at that".)  You should try and understand some basic things about surveys; that will help you a great deal in the future. 

Another hint: the relevant questions are not comparing education systems in different countries.    As for your focus on that one "score", which you do not actually understand, you might also want to look at the other education "scores". Even your bizarre interpretation does not help you.   The question on which Kenyais no. 36---5.03 "In your country, how well does the education system meet the needs of a competitive economy?".  (1 = not well at all; 7 = extremely well) ---is one of the questions for 5.03 to 5.06.  If you look at the overall score for that part "5. B: Quality of education", Kenya is at no. 63.   

I'm sure all other Nipateans get the points made, given that the relevant information is readily available to all: http://reports.weforum.org/global-competitiveness-report-2015-2016/competitiveness-rankings/   

For you, I will repeat: All of the above is probably a bit subtle for you, but spend some brain time on it.    I can assure you that you will be rewarded.    Good luck!

[RV Pundit]

You're wasting your time. They ranked the countries coz the data from those top business leaders is not far from the truth. They are spot on on education (bar a few exception of course) just like they rank kenya bottom on corruption based on perception. If the data is not suppose to be use this way or that way - why rank and compare countries? Negativo kweli. When Kenya ranks highly in something..you go digging the methodology...while on indicators it ranks very badly..it all kosher!

As I said at the start:  Pay careful attention to the following, because you are about to learn something useful on how to interpret the results of a survey.

A hint again for you: It is not just the fact of the survey, but what it consists of and how the results are interpreted.   (I wrote that "part of results and rankings are no more than surveys of perceptions, and local perceptions at that".)  You should try and understand some basic things about surveys; that will help you a great deal in the future. 

Another hint: the relevant questions are not comparing education systems in different countries.    As for your focus on that one "score", which you do not actually understand, you might also want to look at the other education "scores". Even your bizarre interpretation does not help you.   The question on which Kenyais no. 36---5.03 "In your country, how well does the education system meet the needs of a competitive economy?".  (1 = not well at all; 7 = extremely well) ---is one of the questions for 5.03 to 5.06.  If you look at the overall score for that part "5. B: Quality of education", Kenya is at no. 63.   

I'm sure all other Nipateans get the points made, given that the relevant information is readily available to all: http://reports.weforum.org/global-competitiveness-report-2015-2016/competitiveness-rankings/   

For you, I will repeat: All of the above is probably a bit subtle for you, but spend some brain time on it.    I can assure you that you will be rewarded.    Good luck!

[Kim Jong-Un's Pajama Pants]

We are not expert in teaching and education to deeply and technical question this. For me this is an investment that  Gok has given to every kid. They can use or misuse the tablet - I know the majority will find lots of ways to make teaching of kids more fun, more easier and in the end the quality of teaching will improve. Those kids will find lots of ways to use the tablet on their own. This 17-20B would have disappeared in NYS like scheme..but here are folks doing a decent amount of working wiring up schools, training 70,000 teachers, hiring 200 ICT officers, delivering 1.2m tablets, rolling out digital content and coordinating all this...and all we can do is to claim to be expert in pedagogy after reading one OECD report.

Yep.  It's a no-brainer that to benefit from any technology, the basic skills, literacy and numeracy have to be in place or NOT ignored at the very worst.  One could argue that these skills could be acquired by the use of technology - I know there are things like raz-kids and xtramath that kids here use to supplement what they are learning in the respective fields. 

I want to give these guys the benefit of the doubt - hopefully I don't sound delusional - and assume that they have something along those lines as part of the learning materials.  On that measure, I would say a lazy or otherwise useless teacher can narrow the gap somewhat in the relevant skills just by teaching the kids how to use these things - it comes down to what is on those devices.

Still I agree that it is true, and indeed confirmed by numerous studies among them the OECD one, that dumping computers and learning materials at kids cannot make up for the deficit of good teachers and learning environments.  You need a person, ideally a professional who understands child development, psychology, learning and cognition.

Nobody is claiming expertise in anything.  That should be no excuse for not trying to understand or undermining people trying to understand the same issue.  If you don't want to look at it in detail, that's up to you.  Nobody is forcing you.

[RV Pundit]

Nobody is forcing you to stop engaging in the ever pointless fault finding. The drill is predictable for me. This is m-pesa redux.

Nobody is claiming expertise in anything.  That should be no excuse for not trying to understand or undermining people trying to understand the same issue.  If you don't want to look at it in detail, that's up to you.  Nobody is forcing you.

[MOON Ki]

Infact after googling like you .The nearest you can find to PISA like testing in Africa that include kenya is Sacmeq test for reading and math skills..and kenya came second after Mauritus. Not too dismilar to WEF ranking.
http://resep.sun.ac.za/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Spaull-2012-SACMEQ-at-a-Glance-10-countries.pdf

Here in 2011- Kenya ranked second in Southern and Eastern Africa after Mauritus -in SACMEQ
http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Kenyan+pupils+top+in+Africa+/-/1056/1286490/-/view/printVersion/-/wta2f3/-/index.html

http://www.sacmeq.org/ReadingMathScore

The WEF survey for the part that includes maths has this question:

The WEF "ranking"  "puts" Kenya at no. 78 out of 140 and "puts"   South Africa at no. 140 out of 140.    Your bizarre  interpretations of the questions, response, and "rankings" makes things very interesting indeed: South Africa is in serious trouble!   

[Kim Jong-Un's Pajama Pants]

Nobody is forcing you to stop engaging in the ever pointless fault finding. The drill is predictable for me. This is m-pesa redux.

Nobody is claiming expertise in anything.  That should be no excuse for not trying to understand or undermining people trying to understand the same issue.  If you don't want to look at it in detail, that's up to you.  Nobody is forcing you.

There is no pointless fault-finding.  Just re-read what I have written, if you have even bothered to do that before.

I was initially totally opposed to the laptop project.  Ironically because I was happy to learn about it from you and other proponents - without bothering to actually see what it is about. 

Now, having looked at it some from the horse's mouth - following a link you provided, I am willing to cut them slack and being somehow supportive.  If you find that pointless fault finding, that's your opinion.  But don't expect people to believe just because you said it without demonstrating how. 

[RV Pundit]

South Africa education basically sucks. This is not new to me. Both WEF and SACMEQ -and other data points I have read over the year confirms this. The quality of education that we have in kenya is very very good. This is not something I just learnt from WEF but something I and those top business leaders interviewed have always known.

Infact after googling like you .The nearest you can find to PISA like testing in Africa that include kenya is Sacmeq test for reading and math skills..and kenya came second after Mauritus. Not too dismilar to WEF ranking.
http://resep.sun.ac.za/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Spaull-2012-SACMEQ-at-a-Glance-10-countries.pdf

Here in 2011- Kenya ranked second in Southern and Eastern Africa after Mauritus -in SACMEQ
http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Kenyan+pupils+top+in+Africa+/-/1056/1286490/-/view/printVersion/-/wta2f3/-/index.html

http://www.sacmeq.org/ReadingMathScore

The WEF survey for the part that includes maths has this question:

The WEF "ranking"  "puts" Kenya at no. 78 out of 140 and "puts"   South Africa at no. 140 out of 140.    Your bizarre  interpretations of the questions, response, and "rankings" makes things very interesting indeed: South Africa is in serious trouble!   

[MOON Ki]

You're wasting your time. They ranked the countries coz the data from those top business leaders is not far from the truth. They are spot on on education (bar a few exception of course) j

The opinions are localized to the countries; nobody was even asked how his or her particular country compares with others.

Let me put in terms that even a manamba should be able to understand: having a man tell you how beautiful he thinks his wife is tells you nothing about (a) how beautiful his wife actually is or (b) how his wife actually compares with the wives of others who may have given all sorts of ratings.   

I know all this is quite difficult for you, but please put some effort into understanding it.     It is the sort of basic thing that helps people understand the world around themselves.

[MOON Ki]

Here in 2011- Kenya ranked second in Southern and Eastern Africa after Mauritus -in SACMEQ
http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Kenyan+pupils+top+in+Africa+/-/1056/1286490/-/view/printVersion/-/wta2f3/-/index.html

http://www.sacmeq.org/ReadingMathScores

As I have pointed out in other matters, being the best or second best of a down-and-out lot does not tell us much.

GOK's National Education Sector Plan 2013-2018 will be found here:  http://www.globalpartnership.org/content/education-sector-plan-2013-2018-kenya

Among the things it tells us (page 34):

- only 3 out of 10 children in class managed to perform class 2 work
- 11 out of 100 learners in class 8 were not able to perform simple standard 2 mathematics problems
- 7 out of 100 learners were not able to read a simple story in English of Kiswahili

I'd worry about such things before I got worked up about laptops for toddlers.

Education attainment at secondary school level is low with three quarters of candidates not achieving the minimum grades desirable for admission in university of other middle level colleges.   

75% is a staggering figure.   Keep in mind that this is concrete data, not someone just being asked what he or she thinks.