The assessment of secondary school success is according to the number of students they are producing to join universities and other higher learning institutions. To increase access to all pupils from primary schools to access secondary schools, the government of Kenya upgraded previously extra county schools to national status to ensure regional distribution of schools across the nation. With the upgrade, the government was required to inject funds to enable facilities expansion. Despite the upgrade, the money allocated and disbursed to schools has always been inadequate to meet the needs of students. Therefore, this demands that school management makes plans for financial mobilisation to ensure that school operations are done without interruptions. The paper looks at the financial resource planning strategies that upgraded national schools in western Kenya have in place for the purpose of improving their performance. Data was collected from eight of the upgraded schools making up the study population where principals and teachers were the respondents. A sample of 156 respondents was selected to answer research questions through interviews and questionnaires. Analysis of data was performed using quantitative and qualitative methods. SPSS facilitated quantitative data analysis. The study found out that schools experienced financial shortfall arising from inadequate capitation grants from the government and delay in payment of schools by students. To cushion themselves, schools had made several financial plans like applying for grants for infrastructure development. Further, despite schools having large tracts of land, some school management did not put into use either through growing grass for dairy farming or planting crops for subsidising school food supplies. Computed correlation statistics showed a weak correlation that existed (r=0.191 and p=0.016) between financial planning dynamics and academic performance of upgraded national schools in the western region of Kenya. The paper concludes that financial resource planning strategies had minimal effects on the academic performance of upgraded national secondary schools in Kenya Certificate of Secondary examinations. The paper recommends that there is a need for school administration to work with stakeholders to identify profitable projects that can be implemented in their school to earn income.

Infrastructure resource planning is important to ensure provision of quality education in public secondary schools. When the extra county public secondary schools were upgraded to national status, it was expected that the increased enrolment would match with expansion of existing facilities. This paper addresses the infrastructural resource planning dynamics and performance of upgraded schools in western Kenya. The study adopted a descriptive research design; the target population were 263 and 8 principals from teachers in the 8 upgraded national schools. The sample size was 156 respondents purposively sampled for principals and heads of departments, while teachers were sampled using random sampling technique. Data was collected using questionnaires, interview schedule and observation checklist. The collected data was analyzed using descriptive statistics. Research data showed that Infrastructural resources planning dynamics had no significant (r=0.063, p=0.432) with performance of the upgraded schools to national level. The result found out that the increased enrolment did not match with increased infrastructure facilities. The paper concludes that performance of students in KCSE examinations was negatively affected as the available infrastructural facilities could not accommodate high number of learners admitted hence affecting effective teaching and learning process. The study recommends that Ministry of Education should increase allocation to upgraded national schools to expand their infrastructure and upgraded schools board of management should mobilise financial resources to enable them to put up new and expand the existing facilities for quality secondary education. <p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/edu_01/0720/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

The success of students in secondary schools’ systems is measured by their performance at the end of course examinations. In Kenya, the end of secondary school level of education examination is the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education. This paper looks at the performance of upgraded extra county schools to national status in western Kenya. The research adopted a descriptive research design; the target population were 295 teachers and eight school principals in upgraded Extra County Schools to the national level. Sample size calculation formula by role was used to get 170 teachers who were selected through a simple random sampling method, whereas all eight Principals were selected using purposive sampling. Data for this investigation were collected through teacher questionnaire, interview schedule for Principal and document analysis guide for secondary data. Analysis of data was done using frequencies, percentages, means, standard deviation and one sample statistics. Results showed that there was an -18.7% change in KCSE performance from the year 2013 to 2018. Hence the upgrading of national schools in western Kenyan resulted in to drop in performance in all the upgraded schools under study. The study recommends that TSC should deploy more teachers in these schools, government to increase its support towards the upgrading of infrastructure in the upgraded schools in the region and the board of management to be proactive in planning for quality education provision in their schools.

The performance of upgraded extra county schools to national status in Kenya continues to attract key stakeholders when the time the KCSE results are being announced. This is because despite their upgrading, the performance of these upgraded new schools continues to worry stakeholders. This paper investigates how the planning for instructional resources influences academic performance. A descriptive survey research design was used with the target population consisting of 8 principals and 295 teachers from 8 upgraded extra county schools to national status in Western Kenya. A sample of 170 teachers was selected through simple random technique to be involved in the study. The instruments used to collect data consisted of questionnaire and interview schedule. Data analysis has been performed using quantitative and qualitative forms. Quantitative analysis of data has been facilitated by use of descriptive and inferential statistics with the help of Statistical Product and Service Solutions (SPSS Version 25.0). The study found that aside many instructional materials required in schools, only text-books for students were supplied in adequate quantity. However, learning resources for teachers (including reference books) were not adequately provided to these schools. In line with the government agenda of promoting ICT knowledge, the study discovered that ICT resources like computers were not adequately provided after the Extra County Schools in the region were upgraded to national status in Western Kenya. Correlation statistics showed that there existed no significant relationship (p>0.05) between instructional material planning dynamics and performance of Extra County Schools after they were upgraded in Western Kenya. The paper recommends that there is need for schools to consider adoption of new instructional media in teaching and learning.