Effective management of student affairs in public universities continue to pose a major challenge to university administrators and student leaders in many parts of the world including Kenya. Public universities are perpetually ravaged by rampant incidences of student unrests and strikes yet innovative approaches meant to curb such incidences have been adopted that involved student leaders in governance of institutions of higher learning. The effectiveness of these innovative approaches in university governance is not clearly documented. The rationale of the study was to analyse the challenges faced by student leaders in managing student affairs in public universities in Kenya. The study employed descriptive survey research design. Stratified random sampling was used to select student leaders from public universities in Kenya. The sample size comprised of 19 members of student governing councils, 50 class representatives and 73 clubs and society leaders, making a total of 142 respondents. Data was collected using questionnaires. Analysed data revealed that 50.4% of the student leaders experienced challenges while executing their functions. The major challenges included conflict between academic pursuits and leadership roles, lack of teamwork among student leaders and students’ ignorance of university policies and statutes. The study further established a strong and statistically significant relationship between the challenges faced by student leaders and effective student affairs services in public universities at 0.05 levels of significant with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.789. The study concluded that challenges experienced by student leaders may impede effective discharge of their duties and may result in poor service delivery leading to incidences of riots. The study recommends that student leaders should be assisted to solve internal problems that may affect the effective discharge of their duties as a way of addressing unrests in public universities.

The influence of the sense of belonging to school on learners’ loneliness in single gender and co-educational schools in the world and Kenya in particular is not clearly known and documented. Available literature indicates that the learners’ sense of belonging to school significantly impacts on their loneliness. The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of the sense of belonging to school on learners’ loneliness in single gender and co-educational schools in Murang’a County in Kenya. The study was guided by the following specific objectives, which were to; Compare the levels of loneliness among learners in single gender and co-educational schools in Murang’a County and assess power of sense of belonging to school in determining the loneliness levels among learners in single gender and co-educational schools in Murang’a County.  The study adopted the cross-sectional survey research design. The Krejecie & Morgan Table was used to select a sample of 435 participants from a target population of 12,400 form two learners from single gender and co-educational secondary schools in the County.  Data was collected using two standardized measurement instruments; the Perth aloneness-loneliness scale (PALs) while sense of belonging to school was measured using five statements in a five point Likert scale developed for the study. Administration of the questionnaire was done during normal school days by trained research assistants.  Data was analysed using the descriptive and inferential statistics with the aid of the Statistical Package for Social sciences (SPSS) version 20.0. The findings of the study indicated that low sense of belonging to school for girls in co-educational institutions was correlated to high levels of loneliness. From the findings of the study, it is concluded that there is need to strengthen the psychosocial support systems for learners in co-educational schools through mentorship, guidance, coaching and counselling to facilitate appropriate adjustments of the learners in the schools so as to promote their learning outcomes.

Performance in Mathematics among pupils in lower primary schools in Kenya is a problem that continues to be a concern to parents, teachers and stakeholders in education. Teacher related factors and in particular teacher preparedness has been cited as a major contributing factor to poor teaching methods which fundamentally translates to pupils' poor performance. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the influence of teacher preparedness on pupils' performance in Mathematics in lower primary schools in the Aberdares region of Kenya. The objectives of the study were to; evaluate the influence of teachers' preparation of lesson plans on pupils' performance in Mathematics in lower primary schools and assess the influence of teachers' preparation of schemes of work on pupils' performance in Mathematics in lower primary schools from the Aberdares region in Kenya. The following hypothesis were tested; Ho1: There is no statistically significant relationship between teachers' preparation of lesson plans and performance in Mathematics among pupils in lower primary schools, Ho2: There is no statistically significant relationship between teachers' preparation of schemes of work and pupils' performance in Mathematics in lower primary schools. The study adopted the descriptive survey research design. The study was guided by the Social Constructivism Theory (SCT) advanced by Vygotsky (1978). The target population for the study consisted of all the 385 teachers and 1320 pupils in the public primary schools in Aberdares region of Kenya. A sample of schools was selected using Gay's 10-20% sampling principle which yielded a sample size of 77 teachers and 264 pupils. Data for the study was collected using questionnaires administered to the respondents. The t-test statistic was computed to test the hypothesis which stated that there was no statistically significant relationship between teachers' preparation of lessons and pupils' performance in Mathematics. The t-test yielded a p-value = 0.027 which was less than the α-value of 0.05 hence the hypothesis was rejected. It was concluded that there were differences in pupils' performance in Mathematics depending on teacher preparation of lesson. Regarding the preparation of schemes of work, the computed t-test statistic yielded a p-value = .039 which was less than the p-value of .05. Therefore the null hypothesis was accepted. It was concluded that the pupils Mathematics mean scores were relatively the same regardless of whether the teacher prepared schemes of work or not. It is recommended that there is need for teachers to institutionalize as a best practice the preparation of professional documents before commencement of teaching.

Influence of Teacher-Student Relationships on Learners' Loneliness in Single Gender and Coeducational Schools in Murang'a County, Kenya 1. Introduction There are concerns expressed by stakeholders in education regarding the influence of the teacher-student relationship on the loneliness levels among learners in schools in the world and Kenya in particular. Loneliness is believed to greatly impact on the school outcomes of the learners in schools especially in Murang'a in Kenya. Public schools in Kenya can either be of coeducational or single gender. The school can also be a boarding or a day school. Boarding schools are characterized by restriction of movement in and out of school for students except during open days when parents and guardians can visit the students. The schools are manned by teachers and students' time is programmed with little time for self-directed and socialization activities. Major chunk of time is taken by academics. The boarding facilities are more likely to be outstretched and congested. Diet is usually repeatedly monotonous. Where the school is of coeducational, facilities like fields, halls, transport, classrooms are shared. Only the sleeping areas are strictly for the designed gender. Students in Kenya spend more than 75% of their time in school, making the school environment impact on growth and development of the students longer than other social environments. Recent occurrence of indiscipline and burning of schools could be linked to school gender contexts as the behavior is largely observed in boys' boarding schools. it is suspected that boarding schools have undesirable level of loneliness. 2. Empirical Literature Loneliness is unpleasant emotion arising from awareness of social deficiency. It is the perceived difference between desired and the present level of quantity and quality of relationships. Loneliness is not synonymous with solitude,