Education Ministry will from September this year issue Unique Personal Identifiers to students. Photo/the-star.co.ke.All students in public institutions will from September this year be issued with a Unique Personal Identifiers (UPI) in place of the traditional index numbers.
According to the Ministry of Education, the UPI which will have 6 characters, will replace the admission and index numbers schools give to students upon joining the school and for purposes of registering for the national examinations.
Candidates in this year’s national examinations will be the first batch to use the UPI as the ministry is expected to launch the National Education Management Information System (Nemis) on September 28, that will see details of learners uploaded on the system for easy identification.
Education CS Fred Matiang’i said that students will use a single UPI at all levels of their education right from ECDE to university as this will make it easy to track their education progress and eliminate the culture of fake certificates.
Speaking at the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development during the sensitisation of education officials on the use of Nemis, Mr Matiang’i said the implementation of this system will lead to better, personalized educational service delivery.
“It is time for us to now operate as sensible responsible people who have accurate information on the education sector of our country, people who can tell you with a measure of certainty how many children we have in school and how many children are out of school.”
“It should never be guesswork as we go forward on the resources we are allocated and where they are going,” said Mr Matiang’i.