Relationship between Timeliness and Consistency in Disbursing Bursary Funds to Needy Learners and Equity in Access to Secondary School Education

The government of Kenya has put in place various measures such as constituency bursary fund in her effort to enhance equity in access to secondary education. However, access to secondary school education in Kenya and Sub-Counties such as Koibatek is linked to one’s demand for education. Equity in access to education may be attributable to timeliness and consistency of bursaries allocated to needy learners in secondary schools. This study examined the relationship between timeliness, consistency of bursary allocation and equity in access to secondary school education in Koibatek Sub-County, Kenya. This study was guided by the classical liberal theory of equal opportunity. It adopted concurrent mixed method research design. The target population comprised of 42 school Principals, 560 class teachers and 7 members of the Constituency Bursary committee in Koibatek Sub-County. Stratified, proportionate and simple random sampling techniques were used to select 36 principals and 226 class teachers who took part in the study. All the 7 members of the Constituency Bursary Committee (CBF) were also involved in the study. A principals’ and class teachers’ questionnaires, and CDF committee members’ interview guide was used to collect data. Face and content validity of the three instruments were determined through expert judgement. The principals’ and class teachers’ questionnaires were piloted for reliability. They were deemed reliable as their coefficients were 0.832 and 0.801 respectively. Data was analyzed with the aid of the Statistical Package for Social Science. Qualitative data was analyzed thematically while hypotheses were tested at .05 significance level using the Pearson correlations test. The study established that timeliness in disbursement [r(28) = .512, p = .004 were significantly related to equity in access to education. However, the relationship between consistency of amount of bursary allocated and equity in access to education was positive but not statistically significant, r(28) = .058, p .763. The study concluded that timeliness in disbursement influenced equity in access to education while consistency of amount of bursary allocated did not. The findings of the study are expected to provide useful data for education stakeholders to come up with the right policies to guide disbursement of bursaries to needy secondary school learners in the country.

Timeliness, consistency, Needy learners and Equity in access to Education

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