Access Of Primary Education To The Pastoralist: A Case Study Of Namanga Division Kajiado County

ABSTRACT In this research project, the researcher dealt mainly with access of primary education to the pastoralist of Namanga division, Kajiado County in the Rift valley province of Kenya. The objectives of the study were to find out how household conditions, educational facilities, socio-cultural practices and environmental factors affect access to primary education to the pastoralist of Namanga division. The design of the study was descriptive survey design where a sample size of 20 out of 39 public primary schools in the division, were selected for the study. These represented 51.3% of the total population in the schools. The head teachers of these schools were selected automatically from the study sample. A simple random sampling technique was used to identify 5 teachers per school. A total of 100 teachers out of 273 teachers were sampled making a total sample size of 120 respondents. The data was obtained using structured and semi-structured questionnaires which were administered to the head teachers and teachers in the respective schools. An interview schedule was also administered to the Assistant Education Officer (AEO). The data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and summarized using tables, pie charts, bar graphs and percentages. Chi square was used to test if there was any significant difference between variables. The results indicates household conditions such as the type of house, source of light and economic activities of the parents, educational facilities such as type and location of schools, writing materials and textbooks and environmental factors such as drought and famine affect access to primary education. Socio-cultural practices such as Moranism and circumcision (X2=6.988, P=0.008) and provision of lunch in schools (X2=7.179, P=0.007) were the most significant factors affecting access to primary education at P