ABSTRACT
Education participation is a crucial factor impacting the life chances of everyone globally. Despite the investment on education by the government, Kenyan schools are still experiencing dropout. This study was undertaken mainly to investigate the home and school determinants of school dropout rates in mixed day secondary schools in Laikipia East Sub-County, Laikipia County. The specific objectives of the study were to investigate: the direct home- based factor determining the school dropout rates; the indirect home- based factors determining the school drop outs rates; the direct school- based factors determining the school drop outs rates; and the indirect school- based factors determining the school drop outs rates in public mixed day secondary schools in Laikipia East Sub-county. The study was based on Maslow‟s theory of human motivation. This study employed descriptive survey design, where independent variables were home and school determinants of school dropout rates. The intervening variable was government intervention whereas the dependent variable was the school dropout rate. The target population for this study involved students who dropped out of school, from all 15 mixed day secondary schools in Laikipia East Sub-County- Laikipia County between 2013 and 2017. The study applied snow balling and accidental sampling technique to sample the school dropouts. For the school dropout students, ten percent (217) of the target population of 2166 was selected. The researcher adopted the questionnaire as the primary instrument of data elicitation from school dropout and key informants who comprised principals and teacher counsellors. Observation method was the secondary elicitation method. The researcher pre-tested the questionnaires using 2 teachers, 2 principals and 10 school dropout from two of the secondary schools in Laikipia Central Sub-County which were randomly sampled. The researcher reviewed the data for the completeness of the questionnaires after completing the data collection and before embarking on compiling and coding the data. Coding was carried out to make data reduction feasible and manageable for analysis by using numerical values. The data was coded and entered into the Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet and transferred for analysis to the Statistical Software for Social Scientists (SPSS). Simple frequencies, percentages, and means were used to tabulate and interpret the quantitative data. Qualitative data derived from open-ended questions were evaluated on the basis of the research goals and research questions and inferences and conclusions were drawn afterwards. Using frequency distribution tables and percentages, the results were then presented. The study found that direct home determinants are preoccupation of parents and guardians, impact of distance of school from home, and family size of school dropouts. The study concluded that the fear for failure in exams recurrently, cost implication, and teachers „characteristics including professional qualification and experience were the major determinants of school dropout. It was recommended in the study that the Ministry of Education should ensure that there are adequate day schools to ensure that students do not walk over long distances to get to school. The teacher counsellor should be relieved of their teaching duties and should preferably be the school chaplain. The study further recommended that all day secondary schools to be fully developed, equipped and given enough personnel.
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION AND CONTEXT OF THE STUDY
Introduction
This chapter focuses on the background of the study, statement of the problem, purpose of the study, research objectives, research questions, significance of the study, research limitations and delimitations, assumptions, theoretical framework and conceptual framework.
Background to the Study
A key factor affecting the life chances of all inclusive people is engagement in education. Article 13 of the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of the United Nations recognizes that everyone has the luxury of training. More elevated levels of instructive accomplishment in any social intervention, they are aligned with better wages and advance assistance in enhancing job opportunities. A research by Rumberger (2011), based in the United States of America on California dropout showed that many schools were faced a dropout problem. Four years later, about one-quarter of all students entering ninth grade are unable to earn a diploma. The attendance rate, as shown by the U.S. Department of Education (2012), offers the normal level of learners going to school every day of the year. It also demonstrates the state’s normal participation rate and reflects on how schools stack up. The report shows that in the United States, most schools have high participation rates. In this way, if the participation rate of the school is below the national standard, the school may face challenges in getting students to go to school consistently.
In 2008 at Arizona State University, a study by the Rodel Group Scholars that tracked understudies from kindergarten through high school found that dropout designs were related to poor participation, beginning in kindergarten. They found that social contrasts between the people who graduate and the people who drop out are evident as right on time as kindergarten, with dropouts missing a normal of 124 days by eighth grade (Cabus, Sofie and Witte, 2013). If an enormous amount of understudies are lacking every now and then, it is difficult for the instructor and the class to produce their skills and progress. Normal participation is therefore important as understudies are bound to prevail in scholastic interests when they reliably go to classes.
While parents and students will in general underline that school-related factors as the primary driver, staff in training purviews and educators will in general accept that parental perspectives and the home condition are increasingly compelling. Tinto and Pusser (2006) concentrated on a few different ways of decreasing dropouts of understudies in optional schools around the world. These incorporate production of a compelling direction experience, expanding individual correspondence with counsel to understudies, giving early discovery and mediation to understudies in danger, upgrading the nature of the learning experience, and expanding understudy commitment and nature of the school understanding.
As indicated by Reid (2008), parental-overlooked non-attendance and inability to acknowledge their legitimate obligations, poor parental consideration, mentalities towards schools; just as disposition among schools and guardians, these are a proportion of the reasons for dropping out of education. Reid (2008) also claims
that schools have also been added to dropout levels due to inadequate education and inconsistency in coping with non-attendance between and within schools. The study shows weakness in government especially leniency in application of law, unsuitable curriculum which does not address the needs of learners and inequality in resource distribution. Biddle et al. (2004) discovered that harassing, peer pressure; ‘cool’ to play hooky, absence of career yearnings and low confidence are a portion of the reasons for school drop outs among learners. They further discovered that training purviews, for example, inconsistence strategies and practices of neighborhood schools and instruction government assistance administrations, conflicting referral approaches among schools, contrasts among ward and schools’ arrangement report on participation, poor between organization rehearses and confounded job of social administrations adds to class dropout the need for a procedure to decrease the school dropout rate.
School dropouts in Africa are attributed to multiple causes, including early relationships, female genital mutilation, indiscipline, and early pregnancy, among various problems. In Ghana, for example, techniques were developed to ensure better maintenance of schools however they neglected to reserve explicit strategies to address these rising experiences into the issue of drop out (Akyeampong, Djangmah, Oduro, Seidu & Hunt, 2007). Schools have tried to improve on retention of learners in schools though much needs to be done. As per Ministry of Education and Vocational Training (2009) approach report, the presentation of capitation has urged a few dropouts to re-select, where a fifth out of younger students enlisted back to class because of this arrangement. In those zones where
the school taking care of program has been presented, there is proof that dropout has likewise diminished (MOEVT, 2009).
