Kiage-Tumaini boys high school has always recorded quality grades in almost all recent national examinations, with almost every candidate proceeding to university under direct government scholarship. How they manage to maintain the trend has been a question to many who want to have similar achievements.
The school is currently among the champions in gusii region covering two counties, Kisii and Nyamira. It is managed by a director Joseph Kiage, who has a doctorate of philosophy (PhD) in water related program, but a champion in management and curriculum implementation.
Recent news headlines have had the school taking the lead in producing personnel in society. The big question resonates on how such a small school in terms of physical space can produce marked qualifications nationally.
Whenever you are in Kiage-Tumaini boys, you will appreciate the process. Everything is always under control and in motion. The director has instituted a system that every member of staff, teaching and non-teaching must adopt.
Instructors in this school are mostly young and fresh graduands from university and colleges. Only a few are retirees and maybe one or two whose contract with the teacher’s employer (Teachers Service commission)Â has been terminated.
While in this institution, some things must be right with you for servival as a parent, student or worker. Below is an analysis of what is happening in the school, making them post such exemplary results.
Kiage-Tumaini boys Truth meter
The school accepts only those learners who are capable and ready to produce quality grades. Being in Kiage-Tumaini is a choice as opposed to chance. Those learners who are not ready to undergo tough moments of study are exempted early enough.
The school has nowadays set standards. Initially, learners with upto 250 marks or slightly below could be accommodated in the school, provided they show improvements with time. Today you need to have more than 280 marks to have a chance in this giant school, or even sometimes 300 marks in KCPE.
Being a private boarding school, the tuition fee is relatively high making other parents unable to manage, even after getting an admission letter.
Syllabus coverage is at the heart of the learning strategies in this school. No content for a class is allowed to spill off to the next year.
All learners have at least a working wrist watch for reading and keeping time. As much as the compound is small(hardly 80m square for the whole school), still the boys have to move by running!
Credit is given to the meals those boys take. The administration tries as much as possible to offer balanced diet every week.
Loosing a class or going late is a serious offence in Kiage-Tumaini, and is treated with the highest level of seriousness. Teachers missing even two minutes are subject to instant deductions at the end of the month in their salaries.
Cleanliness is monitored and followed to the letter in this school. Not cleaning the compound or class means receiving cruel approaches from the director, for both teacher on duty and student in charge. It’s even more brutal to the teacher than the student.
Those boys are thought all the way from morning preps to evening preps. Teacher contact is the norm for this school. Teachers can instruct all the way to 10pm, with learners maintained in class upto 11pm.
To be a teacher on duty means alot in this institution. The paper work you do is sometimes more than the actually hands-on work done in a day. Every event is recorded in an occurrence book, including the intensity of salt in food!
A duty teacher tastes food first before students could serve. The teacher will thereafter give an okay whether to feed on the meal or something else be prepared, if the former is found substandard.
The duty teacher is supposed to visit a class at least once in every one hour every evening and morning preps, with details of what each learner was privately studying indicated in a book for later reference. This means that a teacher is first to wake up for preps and last to sleep after all learners have slept.
No student is allowed to begin taking private studies without properly indicating the date, topic and subtopic of study. It’s mandatory to write time of commencing and finishing reading that subject, before picking another subject.
Students’ books throughout the school are picked at random on every friday by the director, who signs and checks whether there’s a teacher who missed minutes during lessons or neglected leaving assignment, for further action.
The director prefers male teachers due to boarding facility. This way, a teacher is also expected to be a boarding master. It’s a saving strategy and a way to maintain them in school.
A teacher leaving school without notice is an offence, be it week day or weekend. Even on Sabbath (Saturday), the teacher is supposed to fellowship with the boys and be the spiritual guardian for that day, taking them through the Adventist lesson.
Whenever a teacher neglects his/her duty of maybe attending class early, dictating notes/assignments to every lesson or monitoring manure work, all this information is pinned in the director’s office, and will be revisited mostly during the cash salary pays.
The director dictates the intensity of each instant deduction. The role of the offender is to bend law and accommodate the hit.
No student is allowed to misbehave in school, by not taking exams seriously or even use or involvement in drug and substance abuse. For such students, they are hit like the drum of hallelujah, in the presence of parent or guardian. Those parents who are against canning have liberty to transfer their kids to another institution.
The role of school guard is to be at the dormitory door throughout the night. He always brings a mattress and throws it outside the dormitory door, which is in the third floor of the storey building.
The guard has the key to the dormitory door, and maintains all doors under lock and key throughout the night. Whenever a student wants to go for short calls, he knocks for the guard to open and escort him to the washroom.
According to the director, this prevents learners sneaking at night and coming back early mornings, being that the school is near Kisii town. The security guard is therefore responsible whenever such incidents occur.
The director is one of the instructors in the school. He mostly teaches senior students (form three and four) chemistry.
He is the moderator for internal exams in all subjects before they’re taken by students. That guy is simply a genius. He has even chosen celibacy for the sake of concentrating on promoting his work. He says that a woman wastes a lot of men’s time, something he regards an enemy of progress.
The director dislikes staff that is not ready to adopt his system of governance. In case you fall victim, the highest period you’ll be seen in that compound is hardly a half a day.
All teachers must be around during the national exam period. They help to motivate and remind the learners on the content before they take their exams. Being present during this time is not subject to discussion, unless you’re heavily expectant or bedridden.
