Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International

Education

ISSN: 0305-7925 (Print) 1469-3623 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ccom20

Why do pupils dropout when education is ‘free’?

Explaining school dropout among the urban poor
in Nairobi

Benta Abuya, Moses Oketch & Peter Musyoka

To cite this article: Benta Abuya, Moses Oketch & Peter Musyoka (2013) Why do pupils
dropout when education is ‘free’? Explaining school dropout among the urban poor in Nairobi,
Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 43:6, 740-762, DOI:
10.1080/03057925.2012.707458

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2012.707458

Published online: 12 Jul 2012.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 1213

Citing articles: 5 View citing articles

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=ccom20
Compare, 2013
Vol. 43, No. 6, 740–762, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2012.707458

Why do pupils dropout when education is ‘free’? Explaining

school dropout among the urban poor in Nairobi
Benta Abuya*, Moses Oketch and Peter Musyoka

Education Research Program, African Population and Health Center, Kenya

The introduction of universal primary education in sub-Sahara African

countries in the 1990s increased enrolment rates and provided opportuni-
ties to children who were previously not in school. Research demon-
strates that eliminating fees is not the magic bullet that delivers
universal access. This study seeks to determine risk factors associated
with dropout among primary school children in the low-income areas of
Nairobi. Qualitative data is from the Education Research Program, col-
lected between June and July 2008. The study found that: dumpsites in
the two slum sites of Korogocho and Viwandani lure children out of
school; school levies still charged in schools keep children out of school;
and chronic poverty within families lure girls aged 14–16 into transac-
tional sex. In conclusion, the declaration of free primary education is not
sufficient to realize improved educational attainment as dropout after ini-
tial entry negates the purpose for which it was introduced.
Keywords: equity and access; gender issues; primary education

Introduction
Introduction of universal primary education (UPE) in several sub-Sahara Afri-
can countries increased enrolment rates and provided opportunities to children
who were not in school prior to the UPE policies (Ohba 2009; Oketch et al.
2010). Despite being the goal of many countries in sub-Saharan Africa since
the 1960s, providing universal and free primary education (FPE) has
remained elusive for over 40 years in Kenya’s case (Oketch and Rolleston
2007). According to UNESCO (2008), the open democratic systems that exist
in many countries have certainly helped this cause, particularly between 1990
and 2000. As 2015 approaches, access to basic education has been seen as an
end in itself, a human right and a vital part of individuals’ capacity to lead
valuable lives (Birdsall, Levine, and Ibrahim 2005). The importance of FPE
notwithstanding, scholars and development agencies working on education
issues have overemphasized the role of FPE as a ‘magic bullet’ solution to
the challenges of school children in many sub-Sahara African countries. Free

*Corresponding author. Email: atienoa6@gmail.com

Ó 2012 British Association for International and Comparative Education
 Compare 741

primary education provided mass enrolment into schools in Kenya but the
issues of sustainability and primary school completion still remain a chal-
lenge. For example, about 400,000 children who joined grade one in 2003
did not complete grade eight in 2010 (Daily Nation 2011). These children
could have either repeated or dropped out of school (Government of the
Republic of Kenya 2011). Since the Ministry of Education (MoE) in Kenya
has forbidden repetition of classes by students, the possible explanation for
the 400,000 (59%) not completing school on time would be due to dropout.
This means that only 41% were able to complete the primary cycle of school-
ing on time. Figure 1 shows the trends of school enrolment and completion
rates leading up to 2010. The difference between children enrolled and those
who completed school range from 11, 14 and 9.7% in 1999, 2003 and 2009,
respectively. Therefore, leading up 2010 there was a clear indication of the
high wastage levels of about 10%, which can be explained by either repetition
or dropout, with minimal repetition a vast majority of these children must
have dropped out of school.
While access has improved, UPE is still a mirage to many school-going
children. One factor to this mirage is dropout, and there are several factors
that lead to this. Common ones cited in studies include: child-level factors
(Aloise-Young, Cruickshank, and Chavez 2002; Hunt 2008; Lloyd, Mensch,
and Clark 2000), household factors (Chimombo et al. 2000; Guryan 2004;
Hanushek, Lavy, and Hitomi 2006), school factors (Chimombo et al. 2000;
Lee and Burkam 2003) and community factors (Ampiah and Adu-Yeboah
2009; Christenson and Thurlow 2004; Tansel 2002). Nonetheless, there are
unique cases that require contextual understanding, where qualitative narra-
tives of those who have dropped out, together with their parents and com-
munity around the schools, may shed light on possible causes. This study

Figure 1. Primary enrolment and completion rates.

742 B. Abuya et al.

seeks to contribute to the debate on providing FPE for the poor by listening
to the narratives of children who have dropped out, their parents and com-
munity members who are around the schools in the urban slums of Nairobi.
The narratives of the children ‘who have been left behind’ in the FPE era,
the parents and community members will illuminate the alternative ways of
ensuring sustained FPE by the Kenyan government. Below is a discussion
of some of the factors associated with dropout.

Child-level factors
The main characteristics highlighted in the literature on primary-school com-
pletion and dropout rates include child’s gender, age, cognitive skills, nutri-
tional and health status and peer influence (Aloise-Young, Cruickshank, and
Chavez 2002; Hunt 2008; Lloyd, Mensch, and Clark 2000). According to
Lloyd, Mensch and Clark (2000), late school entrants are just as likely to
drop out as those who enter early, leaving late starters with fewer years of
schooling on average. The relationship between the gender of the child and
the ability to complete school is important, especially in the African context,
where cultural beliefs, like son preference in school attendance, are still
upheld (Mensch et al. 1999).

Household factors
Research shows that the main household characteristics that impact on
school-completion rates are household size, parental education, household
income and assets (Chimombo et al. 2000; Guryan 2004; Hanushek, Lavy,
and Hitomi 2006). Household wealth determines the ability of a household
to invest in the child’s education (Connelly and Zheng 2003; Guryan 2004).
If the opportunity cost of a child being in school is high for parents, the
chance of dropping out remains high (Chimombo et al. 2000). According to
Hunt (2008), children from well-off families are more likely to stay in
school than those from poor households, who may never attend school or
are often at risk of dropping out. In addition, children from poorer back-
grounds are in most cases under pressure to withdraw from school as they
get older due to the increased opportunity cost of their time.

School factors
School factors that predict of school dropout include school distance, quality
instruction in the schools and costs incurred by households in keeping their
children in schools. If a school is perceived to be of poor quality and cannot
provide children with the necessary skills, households may decide not to
invest in their children’s education. Thus, poor school quality may discourage
households from educating their children and prefer that they be engaged in
 Compare 743

income-generating activities (Chimombo et al. 2000). According to Lee and

Burkam (2003), students are less likely to drop out from schools that offer
academic courses and few non-academic courses. The authors further argue
that where there is a positive relationship between teachers and students,
dropout rates are low. Hanushek, Lavy and Hitomi (2006) argue that students
attending higher quality schools tend to stay in school longer and complete
higher grades.

Community factors
Community factors that influence dropout are rural or urban location and
level of urban development, distances to regional urban centres and the local
economic activities. Several scholars have shown that communities can
influence dropout rates by providing school children with opportunities to
work during school sessions (Ampiah and Adu-Yeboah 2009; Tansel 2002).
The study further found that households in industrializing communities tend
to better educate their children than households in the agricultural communi-
ties (Tansel 2002). In sum, as indicated in the literature and as argued by
Christenson and Thurlow (2004), school dropout cannot be understood in
isolation of contextual factors as it is as a result of interplay among individ-
uals, households, schools and community factors.

Conceptual framework
In conceptualizing the dropout of pupils in school in the study sites of Korogo-
cho, Viwandani, Harambee and Jericho, we adapt Bronfenbrenner’s (1979)
ecological framework for understanding the educational risk. The framework
asserts that development is a direct consequence of the interactions that occur
within a micro system, such as the school, family and the peer group, and indi-
rectly a consequence of the interactions across the systems.
These systems include the micro-system, meso-system, exo-system and
macro-system. For purposes of this study, we conceptualize the micro sys-
tem of a pupil to be the characteristics that affect individual performance of
the child, the meso-system to be the family or household characteristics, the
exo-system to be the school characteristics and the macro-system to be the
community and societal characteristics that may determine a child to stay in
or drop out of school. According to Bronfenbrenner (1977) students have
innate characteristics such as intelligence, personality, development potential,
experiences and behaviour, which, through effective interaction and balance
with the classroom, household, community and socio-cultural environments,
enhance educational achievement.
Moreover, the community is very critical in the development of the child and
their subsequent behaviour (Heneveld and Craig 1996). There is the interaction
of the community with the individual child, the home in which the child resides
744 B. Abuya et al.

and the school that the child attends (Johnson 1994). A close community inter-
action with the school leads to more meaningful experiences for the children,
whereas a remote community interaction with the school leads to less meaning-
ful experiences. In addition, the education success of students is dependent on
the cultural orientation of the society in which the student is a member. Society
and culture transforms the characteristics of every individual so as to contribute
to a particular collective of a group’s existence (Johnson 1994). Moreover, a
‘child is transformed into a group member by the accumulation of human expe-
riences preserved in the cultural repository’ (45) (see Figure 2).
We come to this study with the understanding that one of the fundamental
means to reaching universal access to education, and reaching the Millennium
Development Goals, is to eliminate barriers to schooling accessibility, such as
school fees. Research has demonstrated that FPE is not the magic bullet that
delivers universal access among the poor within the public school system
(Oketch et al. 2010). In addition, the slum context poses a lot of challenges
(Mudege, Zulu, and Izugbara 2008) that predispose the slum children to the
risk of dropping out of school. We seek to establish those risk factors that
make access to and subsequent sustainability of children in school a dream for
children attending school in the urban slums of Nairobi.

Data and methods

Data and sampling techniques
Data for this study is obtained from the qualitative follow-up study of
children who have dropped out of school within the Education Research

Figure 2. Ecological framework. Adapted from Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological

Framework (1979).
 Compare 745

Programme data sets. Data was collected in the two slum communities of
Korogocho and Viwandani and two non-slum communities of Harambee
and Jericho.1 Children targeted for follow-up were purposefully selected in
Korogocho, Viwandani, Harambee and Jericho between 2005 and 2007.
Purposeful sampling of 40 children provided a selection of participants
who provided information-rich cases worth of an in-depth study. The chil-
dren enrolled in the study had been away from school for at least one year.
For purposes of this study, a dropout is an individual who was enrolled in
school in one given school year, but is not enrolled in the following school
year, has not transferred to another school or learning institution, has not
completed the educational level (in this case, primary) and is not absent due
to death, illness or some other excused absence from school. According to
Patton (2002), purposeful sampling puts an emphasis on an in-depth under-
standing of the phenomenon under study. Data was collected from children
aged 6–9 and 10–13 years. In addition, teachers, community members/lead-
ers and parents and guardians provided information to corroborate the expe-
riences of children (see Table 1).
We employed a qualitative methodology following the work of Straus and
Corbin (1998). We used an interview-based approach to obtain the data from
pupils and teachers. In addition, focus-group discussions (FGDs) were used
to obtain information from parents and community members and leaders.
The pilot study was conducted in the first two weeks of June, 2008. In-
depth interviews (IDIs) and FGDs for the main study were conducted for six
weeks between June and July, 2008 (see Appendix 1 and Appendix 2 for the
IDI guide and FGD protocol, respectively). The interviews were conducted in
Kiswahili and later translated into English after verbatim transcription. The
IDIs lasted between 30 and 60 minutes, while FGDs lasted for at least two
hours (see Table 2 for background characteristics of FGD’s). Each interview
was tape recorded to ensure that all the data were captured. Data collection

Table 1. Number of the dropouts sampled for the study.

Dropouts
Site Age group M F
Korogocho 6–9 3 3
10–13 3 3
Viwandani 6–9 3 3
10–13 3 3
Harambee 6–9 2 2
10–13 2 2
Jericho 6–9 2 2
10–13 2 2
Total 20 20
Notes: M = male; F = female.
746 B. Abuya et al.

was approved by the ethical review board at Kenya Medical Research Insti-
tute.

Background characteristics of the FGD participants

Table 2 shows the demographic characteristics of the FGD participants. There
was a gender balance between the male and female participants, except in
Viwandani where there was 100% participation by males. In addition, the
majority of the participants across all sites were married, with 79, 100, 100
and 75% for Korogocho, Viwandani, Jericho and Harambee, respectively. The
age of the participants was 21 years and over. Korogocho had FGD
participants that cut across all ages. However, in Jericho a vast majority of the
participants (66.67%) were aged between 21 and 30 years. The majority of the
FGD participants had secondary education in Korogocho, Viwandani and
Jericho, with 50, 56 and 77%, respectively. On the other hand, Harambee had
a balanced number of participants with secondary education and more than
secondary education (50%).

Data collection instruments

Semi-structured interview protocols were used for conducting the interviews.
The open-ended questions allowed for free expression of individual opin-
ions, thereby providing a variety of responses from the participants (Patton
1990). For instance, children interviews lasted between 30 minutes and 1
hour. In addition, FGD guides were also used to gather information from
the parents, community members and leaders. On average there were eight
participants in the FGDs. There were separate FGDs for males and females.
Inherent in this method is the aspect of group interaction as the source of
data and the active role of the researcher as a facilitator of the group discus-
sion. Moreover, attempts were made to be gender sensitive throughout the
interviewing process. For example, males were interviewed by male inter-
viewers and a male moderator facilitated a male FGD. Similarly, females
were interviewed by female interviewers and a female moderator facilitated
a female FGD.

Analysis strategy
Nvivo software was used to facilitate the coding process. This software
package facilitated work with the data and assisted in organizing for the
coding process. We generated codes from the concepts that emerged from
the conceptual framework and in the literature as those associated with drop-
out. We also identified codes from reading the first set of transcripts. These
codes are the ones that ‘emerged’ from the data, which Straus and Corbin
(1998) would term as grounded in the data. These were issues that pupils,
Table 2. Background characteristics of FGD participants (n = 48).

Korogocho Viwandani Jericho Harambee

Participants’ characteristics n(%) n(%) n(%) n(%)
Gender Female 6(42.86) 0(0.00) 6(46.15) 6(50.00)
Male 8(57.14) 9(100.00) 7(53.85) 6(50.00)
Marital status Married 11(78.57) 9(100.00) 13(100.00) 9(75.00)
Not married 3(21.43) 0(0.00) 0(0.00) 3(25.00)
Age 21–30 years 3(21.43) 0(0.00) 0(0.00) 8(66.67)
31–40 years 6(42.86) 3(33.33) 1(7.69) 2(16.67)
41–50 years 3(21.43) 3(33.33) 5(38.46) 0(0.00)
Above 50 years 2(14.29) 3(33.33) 6(46.15) 2(16.67)
Missing 0(0.00) 0(0.00) 1(7.69) 0(0.00)
Education level Never attended primary/has primary education 6(42.86) 3(33.33) 1(7.69) 0(0.00)
Has secondary education 7(50.00) 5(55.56) 10(76.92) 6(50.00)
Has higher education than secondary 1(7.14) 1(11.11) 1(7.69) 6(50.00)
Missing 0(0.00) 0(0.00) 1(7.69) 0(0.00)
Compare
747
748 B. Abuya et al.

parents, teachers and the community members identified to be associated

with pupils dropping out of school, and were different from those already
identified from the literature and the conceptual framework. The main goal
of this type of analysis was to discover the extent of the relationship
between reasons associated with dropout as they emerge ‘bottom up’ from
the data, with those that are ‘top down’, obtained from the literature and the
conceptual framework. Matrices were then used to visually display the data
in columns. Matrices are, ‘the crossing of two or more variables … to see
how they interact … [which] can be expanded to a more holistic case ori-
ented style’ (Miles and Huberman 1994, 239). In summary, codes were
important in locating important concepts, themes and relationships. Conclu-
sions were drawn by ‘noting patterns, themes; making contrasts, compari-
sons; clustering; and counting’ (243) from the matrices established.

Results

Education is like a journey to heaven. Everyone should be saved. The parent

and the child should be saved, so that tomorrow we can leave the children in
situation where they can support themselves while we are gone. It is every
parent’s responsibility to support their children and plan their future …
(Female parent, FGD)

The importance of education for children is summarized above by the FGD

respondent. This study found that reasons why children drop out of school
ranged from community/societal issues, school related challenges and fam-
ily-level characteristics. The results show that the presence of adverse cir-
cumstances in the ecological contexts negated the pupil’s ability to stay in
school, leading to dropout. For instance, pupils with personal problems, liv-
ing in households with negative circumstances, attending schools with insti-
tutional challenges and not supported by the community in which the
schools were situated had reduced chances of persisting in school.

Community/environmental issues
The study found that the factors for children dropping out of school
included community factors (described 40 times by the participants), family-
level characteristics (described 57 times) and school-related factors
(described 32 times). The community hindrances to pupils’ successful com-
pletion of primary school in the FPE era included presence of dumpsites
among the poor living within the slums and non-slums where the pupils
resided, insecurity and crime, peer influence, drug taking and alcohol con-
sumption by the pupils. The dumpsites or bomas2 were an ‘attraction’ to the
pupils who wanted to get a source of income to sustain their families or to
sustain their habits – inclusive of drug taking and alcohol consumption. Of
 Compare 749

40 community factors described, 11 were those related to dumpsites. The

presence of dumpsites in the slums lured the pupils from school into money
making ventures. This is what a parent said:

You know our children nowadays are hungry for money. He leaves the house
… I see he has carried his books. He goes down those sides [referring to the
dumping site] and gangs up with those who have gone to pick up things …
plastics … and take them for weighing. (Male parent, IDI)

Another parent reported the addictive nature of money. She said, ‘When a
child starts picking up these things, and gets used to having money, a child
can’t go to school. It’s something like … that becomes sort of addictive
…’
Use of drugs and alcohol was another larger community factor that led
to pupils dropping out of school. Of 40 community factors, 8 were those
related to the use of drugs and alcohol and the presence of day and night
clubs. Older pupils already used to taking drugs and alcohol encouraged the
younger ones to join in the activity. A respondent in a community-member
FGD had this to say:

The bigger boys normally introduce the smaller ones to smoking cigarettes
and bhang [Cannabis satvia]. Some of them see it from the parents who
smoke and drink and they think it is okay. … Once they start smoking bhang,
it automatically affects their school going and they eventually drop out …
(Male community member, FGD)

With regard to the presence of the clubs that play music all day, thereby
increasing idleness among the children and luring them away from going to
school, one parent said:

We know they go to these leisure clubs where they drink, dance and have a
good time. … With time this life of going to the clubs and having money gets
the better of them and such children stop going to school … (Dropout male
parent, IDI)

Community leaders were disturbed about the lifestyle or reckless behaviour

in both the slums and the non-slums. They observed that the children see a
life of alcohol and overall recklessness that diminishes the value of educa-
tion at an early age. One observed:

… there is a big problem due to illicit brews; most of the residents here
are alcoholics. I don’t know if children from Grogan go visiting other
places outside the slums … so it’s like the child knows the only occupa-
tion as brewing and selling the illicit brew. … He will believe this to be
the only occupation available. In such an environment, he will not imagine
that people go to school … (Female community leader, FGD)
750 B. Abuya et al.

Security concerns within the community where the schools are located
also made pupils drop out of school. Of 40 community factors, 10 were
those related to security concerns leading to school dropout. A child who
had dropped out of school said this:

The group gets stationed in one place and they plan on how to strangle people
and snatch their items … I used to be part of it. … They get hold of people
and can even rape children … when such things happen we pupils will fear to
attend school. (Male child, IDI)

In addition, peers also influenced whether a child stayed in school or dropped

out, either at the community level or at a personal level. This they did by lur-
ing their friends away from school to ‘madenga’ sites. For instance, peers
accounted for 4 of the 40 community-related factors for dropout and 5 of the
27 negative personal traits that led to dropout. A parent observed:

Friends to the children are also responsible for this problem. … Children fol-
low others and hope to make a life by selling property [that which they get
from ‘boma’] to get money and spend it. … At this point the child gets out of
control … (Female parent, IDI)

Family-level characteristics
Family level characteristics contributed to a vast majority of the reasons that
were given for children dropping out of school. These included family vio-
lence, family dissolution, family poverty, lack of parental monitoring, preg-
nancy among school girls, illnesses and incapacitation of parents and lack of
sanitary towels for the girls.

Family violence
Family violence accounted for 12 of the 30 family-related reasons for drop-
out. Negative happenings in families were responsible for children’s irregu-
lar attendance of school, leading to school dropout. This included violence
directed towards spouses – the mothers of the children – spilling over to the
children. This violence made children leave the household in order to escape
it. This is what one of the dropouts explained:

… at times my father used to come in drunk and beat my mother at home. …

We used to see them fight, throwing things at each other. … It was not easy
to know or understand what was going on … eventually I got tired of the vio-
lence and I left home to stay with my friends and … I stopped going to
school. (Female child, IDI)

Some of the children recounted how they were abused by their fathers in
the process of the family violence and eventually they gave up on school. A
dropout narrated:
 Compare 751

… my father comes home in the evening, he is drunk and starts beating my

mother … when I ask him for money to take to school, he starts abusing me,
and I feel very bad … one time I felt that I have had enough and just stayed
at home … (Male child, IDI)

Community leaders in one of the slums reiterated the effect of the family
brawls on the schooling of the kids. One said:

… domestic violence also contributes to the problem of dropout. If domestic

brawls are frequent in the house, the child also rebels and runs away from
home and seeks consolation from his friends … (Female community leader,
FGD)

Family dissolution
This accounted for 10 out of 30 family-related reasons of dropout. It occurs
when a nuclear family made up of at least a child and two parents ceases to
be together because of death, separation or divorce. For instance, family dis-
solution caused by the parents’ death put children in the custody of relatives
who could not sustain them in school. A community leader in one of the
slums said:

Many of these children here live with foster parents because their parents have
died of among other diseases, HIV/AIDS. When children are orphaned, they
are taken in by relatives who eventually become overburdened. … In order to
sustain their livelihoods the foster parents tell them that there is no point of
going to school when they must eat in the evening. So, such children are
engaged in commercial work so as to support the household in terms of food.
(Female community leader, FGD)

In addition, the death of parents made children to assume the role of par-
ents. Such children stopped going to school. This is what one of the respon-
dents in the community FGD intimated:

Children who have attained school going age are not enrolled, and if they are,
they drop out because many are playing the role of the parents, and have to take
care of their siblings. Some of them are ‘total’ orphans in that they have no rel-
atives to take them in. If you look at research findings from Nairobi, 40–45%
of households are headed by children. The child cannot therefore go to school
as she is busy trying to make ends meet. (Male community leader, FGD)

Family poverty
Poverty was described both at the community and at the family level. At the
community level, poverty was described 9 times out of 40, while at family
level it was described 4 times out of 30. Family poverty impaired the ability
of girls to complete school. Girls were driven by chronic poverty to engage
752 B. Abuya et al.

in transactional sex. Transactional sexual relationships were not congruent

with school attendance. This is what one girl said:

Sometimes we find ourselves driven into prostitution without realizing it. This
is to support the family, so, a girl sleeps with a man and she is given sh.20,
sh.10 or sh.50. When the girl takes the money to her mother … she will be
congratulated for being able to earn some money and this will encourage her
to continue … (Female child, IDI)

Community leaders participating in FGDs summarized how family poverty

may result in child prostitution. A respondent stated:

Prostitution results from hunger. A child needs to eat yet has no money to
buy food, and there is no food at home. So when she is bought chips for
Ksh.10 she sleeps with the boy or man … the following day such a child will
not attend school. … With time she stops going to school … (Female commu-
nity leader, FGD)

Children not monitored by parents

Inadequate parental monitoring impaired parental knowledge of the where-
abouts and deeds of their children. This was described 7 times out of 27
personal characteristics responsible for dropout. Without monitoring from
parents, children drifted away from school and dropped out. A respondent
in an FGD involving parents said:

If the mother is busy in her own world, and the father is doing his own
things, they really don’t care what the other [including their children] are
doing but they are living together. It is likely to affect the child because there
is no one to give direction to the child. (Female parent, FGD)

Pregnancy among school girls

This was another personal issue that led to school dropout among girls,
described 4 times out of 27 of the personal reasons for dropout. Girls who
found themselves pregnant were not able to continue with school. One of
the teachers intimated:

Girls drop out of school because of pregnancy-related issues. … Some of the

girls come to school and when they leave school in the evening they don’t go
home straight. Instead, they pass through their boyfriends’ place … soon they
realize they are pregnant and they end up dropping out of school… (Female
teacher, IDI)

Illnesses and incapacitation of parents

Children also dropped out of school due to illnesses and incapacitation of
their parents (described 5 times out of 27). Illness and incapacitation
 Compare 753

affected children’s personal concentration in school and for some who had
to take care of their parents, dropping out of school was inevitable. A
respondent among community leaders from Jeri had this to say about paren-
tal illness and school attendance:

… as she has mentioned, the heath status of that family will be the guiding
factor. Sometimes the parents are sick suffering from HIV-related illness …
such a child may miss many days of school until they do not see the use of
going back to school. (Male community member, FGD)

Girls lacked sanitary towels

One nagging personal issue that affected girls and led to school dropout was
lack of sanitary towels, accounting for 7 of the 27 reasons for girls dropping
out of school. Girls could not stay in school during the period of menstrua-
tion and missed attending school for three to five days every month. With
time, some stopped coming to school. A respondent among women who
had interacted with girls said:

… in the case of girls they get periods (monthly) unlike boys so the reasons
for dropping out of school for the two sexes are totally different. And due to
financial constraints these girls cannot afford pads so they decide to stay home
than go to school where other children will laugh at them … (Female commu-
nity leader, FGD)

School-related issues
School factors for dropout ranged from inadequate classroom space due to
congestion (8 out of 32 of school-related factors), lack of rapport and demo-
tivation by the teachers (8 out of 32), to the high fees charged in the
schools, particularly private schools (11 out of 32).

Inadequate classroom space

This resulted into congestion in the classes, making learning difficult
for many children in the schools within the slums. Inadequate classroom
space was described as a school-related factor for school dropout in 8
out of 32 cases. Congestion, an outcome of too many pupils crammed
in one class, was a concern to parents, one of whom had this to
say:

… the other problem is related to the environment in which a child studies.

You find that a child goes to school and has to sit in a room that has more
than a 100 children. A lot of these children will not be learning much since
the teachers’ attention is divided. At some point the child will walk out of
class and may never return … (Male parent, FGD)
754 B. Abuya et al.

Congestion was also due to the introduction of FPE. Faced with

classrooms with many students, teachers were not able to give individu-
alized instruction to children. Teachers work was made more complex
with the entry of adult learners into the classes struggling to be students
amidst young children. Adult learners were neither attentive nor were
they willing to participate in class. Such learners stopped going to
school at the slightest provocation – sometimes brought about because
of punishment by teachers for an assignment not completed. One of the
teachers said:

… because of free education, a teacher has a class of 100 children instead of

50. … This teacher will not have time to attend to them individually. … The
teacher is also trying to cover the syllabus. This same teacher is facing a chal-
lenge from a pupil who joined school late and feels like an adult. If he is
given any instructions he refuses to listen and expects the teacher to ignore it.
The moment the teacher punishes this pupil he will not come back to school
… (Male teacher, IDI)

Lack of rapport and demotivation by the teachers

Students opted to leave school when teachers did not establish a rapport
with them in class. Lack of rapport comprised 8 out of the 32 school-related
factors in this category. Children left school encouraged by their parents,
who exploited the existing negative relationship between the teachers and
the parents. One of the women leaders noted:

When a child comes home and says the teacher has beaten him without any
good reason. … The child says that the teacher does not listen to us but
only listens to a few pupils in the class. … Another time a child comes
home complaining about the same teacher the parent says, ‘leave that
school; that school does not even do well in exams, they only beat and
ignore children … the child takes advantage and stops going to school …
(Woman leader, FGD)

In addition, it was felt that some of the teachers were a source of discour-
agement to pupils, thereby making the classroom and the school environ-
ment de-motivating for the learning processes. For instance, a teacher
humiliated a child in front of other children, exposing what they knew about
the child’s background without being sensitive to the child’s feelings. A
male community leader noted this:

Teachers behave in a peculiar way. If they notice a child is not well

groomed they tend to get oversensitive, A teacher will yell, ‘you! Tell your
mum you are not supposed to come with that torn cardigan.’ ‘you! don’t
come with that blouse’ the child then refuses to go to school. (Male commu-
nity leader, FGD)
 Compare 755

Levies and fees charged by schools

Private schools. Children in the private schools dropped out of school due
to the levies charged by the schools. Levies and fees were described 11
times out of 32. The inability of parents to pay levies resulted in children
missing school. With time, intermittent school attendance led to school drop-
out. Women participants from Koch3 had this to say:

… private schools contribute to the problem of dropout because of the fees

paid. There are many children who would like to attend private schools but
fees keep them from attending school regularly. In some of the schools, fees
may be as little as sh.100 but as long as the parent cannot pay. … The child
will be sent home. … Children are dropping out of school due to fees
charged. … This must be paid before learning continues. (Female community
member, FGD)

Public schools. Parents who had enrolled their children in public schools
incurred extra levies to buy school uniforms, school bags and shoes. If par-
ents were unable to buy these basics for school, their children were kept out
of class. The end result is dropping out of school for such children. A male
community member from Jeri4 said:

Free education has also contributed to children dropping out … many children
have been sent to school but they cannot afford school uniform so we are
forced to step in and buy uniform. It has been a big challenge … these things
can be expensive for a person living in the slum. … A person who earns
about 50 shillings a day … (Male community member, FGD)

Discussion and conclusion

This paper sought to establish why pupils drop out of school while education
is free in Kenya. The study highlights reasons that put children at risk of and
subsequent drop out from school. These factors ranged from community fac-
tors and family-level characteristics, to adverse family situations. Community-
level factors were significant risk factors in school dropout. For example, the
presence of dumpsites and poverty at the community-level were key factors
for children dropping out of school. In addition, the effect of poverty perme-
ated all the ecological levels surrounding the child as (s)he tried to navigate
the schooling process. For instance, poverty existed at the community level,
affected the families who lived within the community, making them lack
basics for their children, like money to pay for school levies. At a personal
level, poverty incapacitated parents’ ability to buy sanitary towels for girls.
From the foregoing discussion it can be seen that poverty in the commu-
nity had multiple effects for children in the slums. On the one hand, poverty
incapacitated parents’ ability to keep children in school. On the other hand,
it pushed the children into money-making ventures, like collecting ‘mad-
756 B. Abuya et al.

enga’ to sell. The acquisition of money led the children into drug use, alco-
hol consumption and frequenting clubs. The consequence was that the chil-
dren were not motivated to re-enter school. This finding is supported by
Mudege, Zulu and Izugbara (2008), who found that idleness, alcohol, drug
abuse and crime did not encourage school attendance among the urban poor.
The consequence of poverty for girls was engaging in transactional sexual
relationships. Transactional sex was one means some girls used to obtain
fundamental needs for themselves and for their families. Thus, lack of basic
supplies and school fees increased the chances of children, especially girls,
needing money, thereby making them more vulnerable to sexual demands
by the older males (Collins 2009). In conclusion, poverty had a common
thread across the ecological system and its complexity in affecting the edu-
cation participation of pupils is significant (Pridmore and Jere 2011). This
study shows that the persistence of children in school would be dependent
on the interaction of community members with the individual child, a posi-
tive environment cultivated within the home in which the child resides and
a connection with the school that the particular child attends.
Our study found that certain family characteristics in the home did not
foster the required positive environment needed by the children to stay in
school. For instance, family dissolution occasioned by death of parents
resulted in such children being heads of households. Child-headed house-
holds were susceptible to increased poverty, reducing the chances of these
children staying in school. This finding is similar to the experiences of
orphans in other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, where they are more likely to
head households (Foster et al. 1997) and even less likely to attend school
regularly if they are double orphaned (Case, Paxson, and Ableidinger 2004;
Monasch and Boerma 2004). Moreover, this study underscores the impact
of domestic violence on children at home remaining a key reason for chil-
dren dropping out of school. Any form of violence against children negates
the global commitment to end all forms of violence against children
(UNICEF 2007, 2009, 2010) and emphasizes the need for school environ-
ments to be made safe and friendly to cushion children whose home
environments are violent (UNICEF 2009, 2010).
This study found that congestion in schools occasioned by the rush by par-
ents to take their children into public schools at the onset of FPE was a risk
factor for dropout. From the narratives of the participants, a classroom with
too many students was difficult to teach. As such, teachers could not give indi-
vidualized instruction to children. This minimized classroom interaction. This
finding is similar to the work of various scholars (Abagi and Sifuna 2006;
Oketch and Rolleston 2007; UNESCO 2005), who argue that when teachers
handle large classes of 60, 80 or 100 pupils, such pupils hardly get the tea-
cher’s attention in class, thereby impairing the learning process. Although the
authors did not establish that reduced attention leads to dropout, the data pre-
sented in this paper leads us to speculate that continual lack of attention
 Compare 757

reduced children’s interest in school to an extent that they ceased going to

school.
However, this study found that some of the teachers did not create a rap-
port with pupils and demotivated the students in the process of their class-
room teaching, exacerbating their risk of dropout. While it is true that
teachers may have been hostile to pupils and demotivated them in the pro-
cess, we conclude that teachers were overwhelmed with the number of chil-
dren they had to teach. We suspect that teachers’ fatigue was transformed
into unfriendliness towards children in the class. Our finding and explana-
tion has also been captured by Wax (2003), when she observed that many
Kenyan students were in the classrooms and yet were not able to meet with
their teacher.
Overall, our findings suggest that among the poor living in slums, both
boys and girls gained initial access into schools with the introduction of
FPE. With the initial access to school, the element of sex preference was
eliminated, at least in the initial phase of FPE. We found that boys
dropped out of school due to the need to make money from selling ‘mad-
enga’ from the dumpsites, while girls dropped out due to pregnancy and
transactional sexual relationships as a result of hard economic realities. We
conclude that the risk of dropout, though different for girls and boys, is a
danger for both.
Narratives from this study show that despite the FPE program, levies are
still being charged in school. For private schools, this was embedded in the
element of being ‘private’, but for public schools the levies catered for items
not covered by the capitation grants to schools by the MoE. Therefore, FPE
did not entirely solve the problems of schooling for the poor (Oketch et al.
2010), who sometimes dropped out of school because of lack of fees to sus-
tain them in school. This finding reinforces the argument of scholars
(Cornelly and Zheng 2003; Guryan 2004) that the wealth of a household
eventually determines the ability of a household to invest in the education
of the children. It should be noted that the increased incidence of low-fee
private schools in poor areas has been seen in slum context in Kenya as a
response to a lack of investment in school quality and an emphasis on
investment in school access during the FPE period (Tooley, Dixon, and
Stanfield 2008). However, the study was limited by the fact that it was con-
ducted in two slum sites of Korogocho and Viwandani and two non-slum
sites of Harambee and Jericho. This study does give insights into the situa-
tion of children in these four sites and to those children who have dropped
out of school. Beyond that, it raises hypotheses from these pupils’ accounts
of problems of school dropout in other schools in urban areas of Kenya.
This paper raises significant policy implications on primary education
of children in the urban context. There is need to have poverty-interven-
tion programs (for instance cash transfers or subsidies), especially for par-
ents/guardians in low-income neighbourhoods. Beyond capitation grants
758 B. Abuya et al.

by the MOE to some private schools in the slums and the recent MoE
initiative to send Quality Assurance Officers to the slum schools, the
MoE may need to look into the quality of teachers who are teaching in
public and private slums schools. More importantly, the government
should strive to attract quality teachers to the slums schools. This can be
done by declaring the slum areas hardship teaching zones, thereby teach-
ers who are employed there can receive a hardship allowance similar to
those teachers who teach in the hardship zones already gazetted by the
MOE. In addition, the government could mandate that teachers who lived
and went to school in the slums prior to their employment should be
employed to teach in the slum areas for a stipulated period of time, as a
way of also giving back to their communities. This would apply even
those whose education would have enabled them to live outside the slum
areas.
Moreover, sustaining enrolment in the FPE era will have to include tack-
ling chronic poverty by encouraging alternative income-generating activities
for households, rather than being solely dependent on the dumpsites. This
intervention would require a sector-wide approach to educational planning
and policy implementation. In addition, this paper recognizes that the MOE
of Kenya should consider models of educational interventions that can pro-
vide the flexible delivery of the curriculum to pupils that has worked in
countries such as Malawi.
In conclusion, pupils’ persistence in school depends on protective factors
being part and parcel of their environment so that the initial gains of FPE are
not eroded. This study underscores the need for interaction between the vari-
ous environments for effective schooling and subsequent education of the chil-
dren in the FPE era. Overall, FPE has achieved much, but there are limitations
and great risk of reversals in the gains caused by dropout. The government
needs to find innovative ways of tackling the chronic poverty in order to
ensure access to school for the poor in the slums, even in the era of FPE.

Acknowledgements
We thank Dr Evangeline Nderu for having led the data collection process. All the
staff of the Education Research Team for their invaluable support in contribution at
various stages of the data collection and writing process. We thank all the study
participants and all whose work and effort have contributed to the production of
this manuscript.

Notes
1. For description of the study sites refer to Mudege, Zulu and Izugbara (2008).
2. Boma is a sheng word that is commonly used by the slum residents to refer to
the particular sites where garbage from across Nairobi is dumped.
3. Koch is a pseudonym for one of the sites of data collection for APHRC.
4. Jeri is also one of the sites for data collection for APHRC.
 Compare 759

References
Abagi, O., and D.N. Sifuna. 2006. Report of the final evaluation of the Tusome
Vitabu Project (TVP) in Tanzania. Dar es Salaam: Care International-Tanzania.
Aloise-Young, P.A., C. Cruickshank, and L.E. Chavez. 2002. Cigarette smoking
and perceived health in school dropouts: A comparison of Mexican American
and Non-Hispanic white adolescents. Journal of Pediatric Psychology 27, no. 6:
497–507.
Ampiah, J.G., and C. Adu-Yeboah. 2009. Mapping the incidence of school drop-
outs: A case study of communities in Northern Ghana. Comparative Education
45, no. 2: 219–32.
Birdsall, N., R. Levine, and A. Ibrahim. 2005. Toward universal primary education:
Investments, incentives and institutions. Washington, D.C: Center for Global
Development.
Bronfenbrenner, U. 1977. Toward an experimental ecology of human development.
American Psychologist 32: 513–29.
Bronfenbrenner, U. 1979. The ecology of human development: Experiments by nat-
ure and design. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Case, A., C. Paxson, and J. Ableidinger. 2004. Orphans in Africa: Parental death,
poverty, and school enrolment. Demography 41, no. 3: 483–508.
Chimombo, J., M. Chibwanna, C. Dzimadzi, E. Kadzamira, E. Kunkwenzu, D.
Kunje, et al. 2000. Classroom, school and home factors that negatively affect
girls education in Malawi. Centre for Educational Research and Training, Draft
Report to UNICEF.
Christenson, S.L., and M.L. Thurlow. 2004. School dropouts: Prevention consider-
ations, interventions and challenges. Current Directions in Psychological Science
13, no. 1: 36–9.
Collins, J. 2009. When schools fail to protect girls: School-related gender-based
sexual violence in sub-Saharan Africa. In Buying your way into heaven: Educa-
tion and corruption in international perspective, ed. S.P. Heyneman, 23–50.
Dordrecht, the Netherlands: Sense.
Connelly, R., and Z. Zheng. 2003. Determinants of enrolment and completion of 10
to 18-year-olds in China. Economics of Education Review 22: 379–88.
Daily Nation. 2011. Editorial. Dropouts: Repeats take toll on free primary educa-
tion. Daily Nation (Nairobi). http://www.nation.co.ke/News/Dropouts+and
+repeats+take+a+toll+on+free+primary+education+/-/1056/1165462/-/11gi03g/-/
index.html
Foster, G., C. Makufa, R. Drew, and E. Kralovec. 1997. Factors leading to the
establishment of child-headed households: The case of Zimbabwe. Health Tran-
sition Review 2, no. 7: 155–68.
Guryan, J. 2004. Desegregation and black dropout rates. American Economic
Review 94, no. 4: 919–43.
Hanushek, E.A., V. Lavy, and K. Hitomi. 2006. Do students care about school quality?
Determinants of dropout behaviour in developing countries. NBER, Working
Paper No.12737.
Heneveld, W., and H. Craig. 1996. School count: World Bank project designs and
the quality of primary education in sub-Saharan Africa. Technical Paper No.
303, Africa TechnicalPaper Series.
Hunt, F. 2008. Dropping out from school: A cross-country review of literature. Cre-
ate pathways to access, Research Monograph, no.16.
Johnson, M.G. 1994. An ecological framework for conceptualizing educational risk.
Urban Education 29, no. 1: 34–49.
760 B. Abuya et al.

Lee, V.E., and D.T. Burkam. 2003. Dropping out of high school: The role of school
organization and structure. American Educational Research Journal 40, no. 2:
353–93.
Lloyd, C.B., B.S. Mensch, and W.H. Clark. 2000. The effects of primary school
quality on school dropout among Kenyan girls and boys. Comparative Educa-
tion Review 44, no. 2: 113–47.
Mensch, B.S., W.H. Clark, C.B. Lloyd, and A.S. Erulkar. 1999. Premarital sex and
school dropout in Kenya. Population Council, Policy Research Division Work-
ing Paper, no. 124.
Miles, M.B., and A.M. Huberman. 1994. Qualitative data analysis: An expanded
sourcebook. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Mudege, N.N., E.M. Zulu, and C. Izugbara. 2008. How insecurity impacts on
school attendance and school dropout among urban slum children in Nairobi.
International Journal of Conflict and Violence 2, no. 1: 98–112.
Monasch, R., and J.T. Boerma. 2004. Orphanhood and childcare patterns in sub-
Saharan Africa: An analysis of national surveys from 40 countries. AIDS 18,
Suppl. 2: 55–65.
Ohba, A. 2009. Does free secondary education enable the poor to gain access? A
study from rural Kenya. Create Pathways to Access, Research Monograph No
21. http://www.create-pc.org/pdf_documents/PTA21.pdf
Oketch, M., M. Mutisya, M. Ngware, and A.C. Ezeh. 2010. Why are there propor-
tionately more poor pupils enrolled in non-state schools in urban Kenya in spite
of FPE policy? International Journal of Educational Development 30, no. 1:
23–32.
Oketch, M., and C. Rolleston. 2007. Policies on free primary and secondary educa-
tion in East Africa: Retrospect and prospect. Review of Research in Education
31: 131–58.
Patton, M.P. 1990. Qualitative evaluation and research methods. Newbury Park,
CA: Sage.
Patton, M.Q. 2002. Qualitative research and evaluation methods. 3rd ed. Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage.
Pridmore, P., and C. Jere. 2011. Disrupting patterns of educational inequality and
disadvantage in Malawi. Compare 41, no. 4: 513–31.
Government of the Republic of Kenya. 2011. Economic survey, 2011. Nairobi: Gov-
ernment Printer.
Tansel, A. 2002. Determinants of school attainment of boys and girls in Turkey:
Individual, household and community factors. Economics of Education Review
22: 455–70.
Straus, A., and J. Corbin. 1998. Basics of qualitative research: Techniques and pro-
cedures for developing grounded theory. 2nd ed. London and New Delhi: Sage.
Tooley, J., P. Dixon, and J. Stanfield. 2008. Impact of free primary education in
Kenya: A case study of private schools in Kibera. Educational Management
Administration and Leadership 36, no. 4: 449–69.
UNESCO. 2005. EFA global monitoring report, 2006: Literacy for life. Paris: Author.
UNESCO. 2008. The EFA global monitoring report, 2009. Paris: Author.
UNESCO. 2010. National education support strategy (UNESS) for the Republic of
Kenya, 2010–2011. UNESCO. http://www.google.co.ke/search?q=National+Edu-
cation+Support+Strategy+(UNESS)+for+the+Republic+of+Kenya+2010+-+2011
UNICEF. 2007. Eliminating violence against children. New York: United Nations.
UNICEF. 2009. Child-friendly schools: Emerging practices in Eastern and Southern
Africa – a human based approach. Nairobi: UNICEF ESARO.
 Compare 761

UNICEF. 2010. The humanitarian action report, 2010: Partnering for children in
emergencies. New York: UN.
Wax, E. 2003. Too many brains’ pack Kenya’s free schools. Washington Post For-
eign Service, 9th October, 2003 A24.

Appendix 1. In-depth interview guide for the dropout children

1. I am interested in learning about some of the experiences you had as a

pupil before you left school and what has been happening in your life
since then. Maybe you could start by telling me the name of the last
school you were in.
2. What kind of school was it?
3. How long were you at the school?
4. What grade/class were you in at the time you left?
5. What reasons made you leave school? Please explain
6. From what you have told me what would you say was the main reason
why you left school?
7. Whose decision was it for you to leave school? Tell me how it happened.
8. What do you remember about the teachers at the school? What were they
like?
9. I would like to learn a little bit about what the community was like when
you were in school. What kind of things happen in this community that
made it hard for you to go to school?
10. What kinds of things used to happen at home that made it hard for you to
go to school? What sorts of things happened that made it hard to do well
in school?
11. What were you doing at home to help your family/parents? What else
was happening at home?
12. What kinds of things did your parents/guardians do to help you stay in
school and do well in school?
13. What has life been like for you since you left school?
14. Given a chance, how interested would you be in going back to school?
Please explain.

Appendix 2. Focus-group discussion guide

1. What would you say are the main reasons why children in this community
drop out of school?
2. Are the reasons why boys drop out similar to or different from the reasons
why girls drop out? Please explain.
3. Are the reasons that older children drop out similar to those of younger
children? Please explain.
4. Do you think there is a difference between the lives of those that remain
in school and those that leave? Please explain further.
5. Now let us focus on children from this community who have never
attended school. What would you say are the main reasons they have
never been to school?
762 B. Abuya et al.

6. Are the reasons why they do not attend the same for boys and girls or are
they different? Please explain.
7. What about older children: are the reasons they do not attend school simi-
lar to or different from those of younger children? Please explain.
8. Do you think there is a difference between the lives of those children who
are in school and those that leave? Please explain further.
9. Would you say that youth in this community use drugs and other sub-
stances and alcohol? If so, what substances are most commonly used?
How do the youth access them? At what ages do they begin to use these
substances? Would you say that this has a direct effect on school atten-
dance and drop out?
10. Whose role do you think it is to ensure that children do not drop out of
school?
11. What can be done at the community level to ensure children go to
school?
12. Some of you are parents of school-going children. Thinking about your
personal experiences with keeping your children in school, what advice
would you give to parents to help them keep their children in school?