Teachers ask Education Ministry to extend NEMIS Learner Registration deadline
Educators from all over the nation are now urging the Ministry of Education to postpone the deadline for registering learners under the National Education Management Information System (Nemis).
They mentioned that this request stems from the continuous malfunctions of the system. The deadline, which expired at midnight on Easter Monday, left numerous schools unable to finalize the process due to ongoing technical difficulties.
This situation has also brought together members of the Kenya Primary Schools Heads Association (Kepsha) and the Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut), who both share their dissatisfaction with the ‘inept’ Nemis portal, which has frequently ‘experienced downtime in the past two weeks’.
According to Kepsha’s national chairperson, Fuad Ali, numerous headteachers were unable to input any information as the system crashed multiple times or failed to load.
That system urgently requires an upgrade because much of its data is used to inform capitation funding for the upcoming school term.
Not registering will result in many schools being underfunded by the government.
He appealed to the ministry to provide the schools with an additional day or two to complete the registration process.
It is intended to supplant Nemis, which, since 2017, has been digitizing data in public and private primary schools in the nation and assigns every learner a distinctive personal identifier to monitor the learner’s academic journey.
However, due to access problems and delays in providing login credentials to headteachers, this has resulted in ineffectiveness within the system.
Knut Secretary General Cohin Oyuu reiterated the demands for an extension, stating that the technical difficulties should not prevent learners from being registered.
He cautioned that not appearing in the Nemis database would hinder children’s access to learning resources and financial aid.
This poses a challenge in the registration process for young children, whose parents lack copies of their birth certificates, which are necessary for generating a UPI.
This is quite prevalent in children who have been placed to be cared for by guardians or grandparents.
Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogambo highlighted during a recent visit to Bomet County that planning and resource distribution would heavily depend on the data produced through Nemis.
The deficiencies of Nemis are indeed causing significant distress for many educators. The ministry will likely need to address this issue as an urgent priority.