ONLINE REVISION OF UNIVERSITY COURSES AT MAARIFA CENTER

BY SHARON KUNAI

Emily Muthoni was overjoyed when she got a chance to learn computer skills at Isinya Maarifa center. It was a dream come true, as she had always had the desire to know how to operate the machines but her parents had no means of taking her to college like some of her colleagues. So the Maarifa center free ICT training was like music to her ears and she savored the opportunity. 

She was delighted to learn that she had qualified for admission to a public university after scoring a B in her KCSE. And when the Joint Admission Board announced that revision of courses was only online, this was a welcome move. After all she had the skills and there was a free internet service at the Maarifa center.

The Story is the same for Ann Wambui and Stephen Mokoro. The Isinya Maarifa center has been a bee-hive of activities in the previous two weeks as candidates of 2012, KCSE have been making efforts to revise their courses.

Talking to Ann Wambui who came all the way from Kitengela for the exercise, I sought to find what she thought of the experience. “It’s the first time I am using the Maarifa center as I recently heard about it from a friend.” She said, “I consider myself lucky because in the other years, the ex candidates had to travel far in order to revise their degree choices.” She added.

Stephen Mokoro, who was a frequent at the Isinya 

Maarifa center during the revision exercise, said that was quite pleased with the services offered but noted that the internet services was slow due to traffic in the Joint Admission Board site and this slowed down the process. He also added that there were times the JAB site was sometimes not available and he had to postpone his revision. Despite these shortcomings, he was able to revise his degree courses and he hopes that he will be able to go to The University of Nairobi to study Medicine.

The revision process came to an end on the 31^st of May and as usual with Kenyans doing things on the last minute, the Maarifa center was packed from as early as 8.00 am with many ex candidates finalizing on the revision.