THE KENYAN BOY CHILD; WHY MANY ARE DROPPING OUT OF SCHOOLS.
One time, back in last year, I wrote of the alarming numbers of ladies attending evening classes at our universities against the few men. Later on in the year I took a walk into the quite many places in Kenya to try and see the progress of the Kenyan boy child at grass root level. Out of my observation, I realized that the numbers of men enrolling for further studies could be far from improving any time soon. There are quite a number of factors to support my opinion. The girl child empowerment is doing well while the boy child needs a critical consideration if at all I and you want to save a generation for generations.
Bodaboda
“Bodaboda” as it is commonly known seems to be the most recent micro enterprise that has taken root in many places across the country. It is a venture that has attracted quite a lot of investment in Kenya. The youth; majority of them, boys, are the drivers of these motorcycles. It has always been broadcasted on media about the untrained nature of these drivers and with each passing hour more and more motorcycles are being purchased while less motorcycle drivers enrolling in driving schools. The effect of this scenario is the death of our youth. A walk especially to upcountry can amaze you with the speeds of the motorcycles. In fact these supersonic speed are done recklessly by the young boys who to make matters worse drive helmet free. It is not surprising why we have very young widowed wives and orphaned children. The rampant bodaboda accidents are an indication of the alarming deaths of our school boys and young youth.
Some school boys don’t concentrate in classrooms at the sight of a motorcycle or its noise since they like “squad” for making cheap coins and we are complaining about poor marks scored by schoolboys in national examination. To most of these boys, learning is of no essence and as long as they are making a few coins for survival, then, all is well. This has affected our education especially that of the boy child in upcountry. Local administration officers have relented on this issue and it is high time it should be treated as alcohol now that school terms are still raw.
Video dens and hawking.
The next set of challenges facing the education of Kenyan school boys is that of hawking. I cannot justify if our capitalistic nature as Kenyans has gotten into the young kids till their love of money has clogged their minds. Our young boy love hawking, in fact they are used as agents by some “bosses” somewhere to sell them products and at the end of the day they will make a small commission. This is a huge problem in towns and major cities in Kenya. The love for the cash generated by the hawking is often used in watching movies and games in local sports and movie joints. The fact that the money being made has nothing to do with buying that highly sought textbook or mathematical set should worry.
Why should it worry us?
The problem with these challenges is that some of the challenged rot can easily influence the other class of good students and we might lose the larger percentage of the good children. This means that we can lose a whole generation by the small mistakes we don’t rectify today. The mistakes we can rectify by fighting these challenges with all our energy. Failing to rectify these problems today means a large spiritual problem and an even greater social problem. This is everybody’s problem and hence should be dealt by everybody. The blame game of cheating and poor results could be far from true by the time this year’s results will be released; that is if we will be loyal to work our problems out.
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