An investigation into causes of drop-out amongst girls in primary schools in Githunguri Division in Kiambu District

Abstract

The major justification of this study was that, despite the effort put on promoting universal primary school education and creating equity in education creating and enabling environment to enable girls and boys to access and attend school, acquire education and progress through up the cohort, the rate of girls dropping out of school is still alarming. Factors militating against girls' education have not been adequately investigated, and well addressed, hence hindering the attainment of universal primary education to this end. This study was survey of the factors that hinder girls from completing the primary education in Githunguri, Kiambu District. A sample of 113 pupils, 11 teachers and four headteachers were randomly selected for the study. The sampling techniques used for the study was systematically random sampling. Data were collected by means of an interview schedule for the headteachers and questionnaire for the teachers and pupils. Descriptive statistics were used in data analysis thus tables of frequency distribution, percentage, pie chart and histogram were used for data presentation. According to the findings, girls' dropout was a problem affecting all the selected schools. The major causes for the dropout were child labour, lack of sanitary facilities, pregnancy, lack of interests, domestic labour, family problems, truancy and poverty. It was realized that inorder to solve the problem, other people need to be involved like parents, curriculum developers policy-makers and school counselors. The results of the study, therefore could be used as a basis of planning for interventions which can reduce discriminatory practices against girls and promote equity of gender in the provision of education.