Secondary school at Isiolo-Meru border grapples with strained facilities

About two-and-a-half kilometres from the diversion to Isiolo Referral Hospital along the Isiolo-Moyale highway is a dusty road to the left leading to MCK Kisima 78 Secondary School, at the fast-growing but contentious Isiolo-Meru border.

The school is registered in Isiolo's Wabera ward but its Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates show it's on the Meru side. The majority of those living in the school neighbourhood access crucial services such as healthcare in Isiolo County.

As one approaches the school, one notices upcoming structures, fenced plots, and businesses on both sides of the feeder road. The school, which has no fence or gate and is located on the same site as the mother primary school, was founded with the Methodist Church of Kenya's backing.

A congested administration block tucked in the middle of two classes, ablution blocks, and a semi-permanent kitchen to the right, an iron-sheet classroom for students taking optional subjects facing the offices, two classes directly opposite the kitchen, and a science lab behind them welcomes you as you enter the school.

Acacia trees at the school offer the students some solace from the scorching sun whose surrounding temperatures sometimes hit as high as 32 degrees Celsius.

A section of the school showing MCK Kisima 78 Secondary School administration block and classes pictured on March 27, 2024. Photo/Waweru Wairimu

The majority of the students hail from Isiolo's Ngaremara and Wabera wards and a few from Meru's Matabithi area. The school which started with 11 students in 2018 has a current population of 218 students, 106 of them being girls.

Being located within the border, the school has faced several obstacles, including a lack of basic infrastructure, periodic insecurity owing to cattle rustling, and a lack of proper assistance from the two counties' political leadership.

Also, the institution, like many others in Isiolo, does not have a title deed putting its 10-acre land at the risk of being grabbed as defrauders salivate for the prime property. There is a protracted land dispute pitting Meru and Isiolo residents in the area which is yet to be adjudicated.

The current administration block is a classroom partitioned into four offices, two of them for the Principal and the Deputy, another for the accountant, and a staffroom accommodating 12 teachers.

Apart from a classroom constructed by former Tigania East MP Josphat Kabeabea during the financial year 2019/2020, the rest have been built by Isiolo North National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF) between 2017/2018 to 2022/2023 financial years save for one class constructed by the Ministry of Education to support Competence Based Curriculum learning.

Two of the classes at MCK Kisima 78 Secondary School built by the Ministry of Education and Tigania East NG-CDF pictured on March 27.

Isiolo North MP Joseph Samal Monday commissioned a Sh4.5 million dining hall and kitchen at the school, his second project at the institution since his first term between 2013-2017, allowing them to shift from a semi-permanent structure they have been cooking from.

Samal had towards the end of his first term built two classes that are still in use. His 2017 successor Hassan Odha, who he defeated in the August 2022 elections, also built a pair of classrooms and a science laboratory at the school.

School Principal Jacinta Kirugi identifies a dormitory, a computer lab, a school bus, and some extra classrooms as the school's most critical needs.

"A number of our students walk for over seven kilometres to school and pass through the forest which endangers their lives. A dormitory would enable them to spend more time on learning and help improve their performance," Ms Kirugi says.

Evarlyn Ngai, a Form Three student from Chumvi Yare which is eight kilometres away from the school, says she wakes up at 4:20 am, prepares in 20 minutes and immediately sets off for the school.

"We have a designated place where we meet (as students from Kisima) before starting off the journey to the school which takes us an average of two hours. We arrive home very tired around 7 pm or minutes earlier," she told Eastleigh Voice at the school.

Encounters with stray elephants are so common along the bushy stretch, both in the morning and evening, and the students no longer fear the animals, she says.

"Our male colleagues help wade off the jumbos whenever they ambush us. They make noise while chasing them away to allow us to run to safety".

Like Evarlyn, Obadiah Asis' story is no different.

"I have an ailing mother who I have been taking care of after school. In most cases, I am unable to study at home due to home chores," he says, adding that the situation becomes worse when it rains as many of the roads are cut off.

They say a dormitory at the school would rid them of the struggle and enable them to concentrate on their studies and achieve their dream of becoming lawyers or journalists.

A class for students taking optional subjects at MCK Kisima 78 Secondary School pictured on March 27, 2024. Photo/Waweru Wairimu

School Board of Management Chairperson Peter Majau said although the institution lacked adequate facilities, the existing facilities were a testament to what NG-CDF could do in the promotion of education in the region.

"We have countless times appealed for grading of the feeder road (to the school) which becomes impassable during the rainy season but no help has been forthcoming from both county governments," lamented a local cleric Agostino Loreng.

The lack of a fence also endangers the lives of students and instructors, with Deputy Principal George Muriira reporting that herdsmen were openly grazing within the compound.

"We are not able to restrict those getting into the compound, putting the lives of the students at risk," he lamented, adding that beautification efforts at the school vicinity had proven futile in the past as the livestock feeds on the plants.

Out of Sh30 million bursaries issued by MP Samal's office to thousands of students in 24 Secondary schools Wednesday, Sh545,000 was disbursed to 109 needy students at MCK Kisima 78 Secondary School.

The legislator has committed to constructing a dormitory at the school in the current financial year.

Caroline Mugo, Isiolo County Director of Education, stated that school development is done on a need basis, with support typically divided among all Isiolo Sub-Counties.

"We conduct an assessment and consider the neediest for support but based on the students' population," Ms Mugo told Eastleigh Voice on the phone.

Sources intimated that the County Education Board had recommended MCK Kisima 78 Secondary School and Kambi Garba Secondary for the Ministry of Education's Infrastructure grant.