Influence of Free Secondary Education Policy on Students' Academic Achievement in Kericho County, Kenya

Globally as countries try to provide Education for All, Free Secondary Education (FSE) policy was adopted in 2008 to enhance access, improve quality, equity, relevance and gender parity in the provision of secondary school education in Kenya. The first cycle of students who benefitted from FSE policy graduated in 2011. The Students’ mean scores in Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education on average was 5.39.  This means that students’ academic achievements was one of the concerns that were to be addressed by FSE policy, however, its influence was unknown. The objective of the study was to determine the influence of FSE policy on students’ academic achievement in Kericho County. The study was based on the concept of investment choices and consequently a conceptual framework was formulated. The independent variable was FSE policy and dependent variable was students’ academic achievement. Descriptive, ex-post facto and correlational research designs were adopted. The study population was 4,457 Principals, Sub County Quality Assurance and Standard Officers, Directors of Studies and form IV students of 2011. The sample size was 485. Snowball and saturated sampling techniques were used to select respondents. Questionnaire, interview schedules, Focus Group Discussion guide and document analysis guide were used to collect data. Quantitative data was analyzed using cohort analysis, descriptive and inferential statistics. Qualitative data was transcribed and analyzed in emergent themes and sub themes. The study established that there was a moderate negative relationship between FSE policy and GPI with a coefficient of -0.44 at a p-value of 0.05, meaning it accounted for 19% of the variation. The study established that there was a moderate positive relationship between FSE policy and students’ academic achievement with a coefficient of 0.69 at a p-value of 0.05, meaning it accounted for 48% of the variation. The study concluded that FSE policy enhanced students’ academic achievement. Though there were other factors like poverty, early employment, drugs and many others that influence academic performance in Kericho County.