Comparative analysis of students’ direct private costs in boarding and day secondary schools in Kenya

Secondary education has been known to be core in the economic development of any country as it is a link to tertiary education. To improve on access, the government of Kenya started to subsidize secondary education in January 2008. This study tried to compare students’ direct private costs in boarding secondary schools to those in day secondary schools. The study was undertaken in Nyamira County, Kenya. The descriptive and ex post facto designs were used. The sample comprised of fifteen boarding schools, fifteen day schools and six hundred form four students. The data was collected using questionnaires and interviews. Data was analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Study findings revealed that the average student’s cost of Kshs 51,177(84.1%) in boarding school is higher than that of Kshs 33,822(71.1%) of day schools. The various costs of boarders were higher than for day scholars while their examination expenditure was not significantly different. The day scholars pay more for only transport because of their more frequency of travel. Both day and boarding schools do not charge the standardized charges as they violate it indirectly through the holiday tuition and remedial teaching levies. The study recommended that the government should increase the subsidy to secondary schools expenditure, encourage community income generating initiatives to support secondary education, intensify using a balanced scorecard approach so as to target secondary schools and or areas that need financial or material assistance, improve on the vetting of approved textbooks to reduce costs and ensure optimum enrolment to minimize the cost