The Ministry of Education and Sports has received requests across the country to take over 200 community and non-governmental organisation (NGO) schools as government-aided primary and secondary schools. 

Officials from the ministry informed the Budget Committee of Parliament recently that the estimated cost to take over the 100 secondary and 100 primary schools would cost sh300m per secondary school and sh64m per primary school. 

This is contained in the committee report on the National Budget Framework Paper for the financial year 2024/25 to 2028/29, which the House approved with amendments on January 31, 2024. 

“The ministry is in need of sh30.2b for taking over 100 secondary schools and sh6.4bn for grant aiding 100 primary schools,” the committee chairperson and Kachumbala County MP, Patrick Isiagi Opolot, told the House while presenting the report for approval. 

Parliament agreed with the committee that the Ministry of Finance commit an additional sh36.6b to the Ministry of Education for grants aiding both primary and secondary schools. 

The capitation grant is an annual commitment from the Government aimed at supporting the education of learners in primary and secondary schools under the Universal Primary Education (UPE) and Universal Secondary Education (USE) programmes.

The government earmarks over sh333b every financial year in capitation grants for the two programmes and this money includes sh158b for UPE, sh146b for USE, sh29.13b for skills development and sh600m for special needs education. 

The funds cover three school terms per year and depend on the enrolment of learners. 

The government pays sh20,000 per pupil per year under UPE, sh58,300 per term for O’level and sh90,000 for A’level as a capitation grant. 

Schools with special needs students under UPE receive sh22,000 per child per year and sh192,500 per learner under USE. 

Before the commissioning of seed secondary schools, statistics showed that there were 12,431 primary schools under UPE and 1, 261 secondary schools under USE.