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Kenya: Kasneb Revises Rules as It Roots for Flexible Exams

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5 years ago

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The professional accounting examiner, Kasneb, is proposing a major shift on the way it organises and manages examinations. For decades, it has been offering professional exams twice every year, in May and November. However, it is shifting gears. The new plan is to offer exams three times a year and eventually four times.

This transition will make the programmes more flexible and enable students to obtain their qualifications within a relatively shorter a time.

At the same time, the organisation is working on a plan to offer online examinations that would be available to candidates any time during the year. But this will begin with the certificate courses before advancing to diploma and ultimately professional qualifications.

For the online exams, Kasneb is planning to work with telecommunication and technology companies which will host and support the administration of the tests. Whereas Kasneb would do the setting, the administration would be done through those companies.

Covid-19 pandemic

This shift is coming from the experience brought about by Covid-19 pandemic. Kasneb has been compelled, like other learning and professional training institutions, to shift its strategies, with accent being flexibility and convenience.

These are among the new plans that Kasneb is putting in place to align itself to emerging realities in higher education and the industry.

In a wide ranging interview with the chief executive, Dr Nicholas Letting, says the organisation was working on a programme that will make teaching and learning more flexible, using the online platforms, and enable more professionals enrol and pursue their courses at their convenience.

“Plans are underway to offer examinations at least three times a year before making them four, that is every quarter, annually,” said Dr Letting. “We are currently putting in place modalities to introduce online examinations which will see candidates book for examinations as and when they are ready to sit for them any time during the year.”

He added: “Given the unprecedented coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic that has brought about a worldwide health and economic crisis, online examinations will provide the candidates with a more flexible route of acquiring professional qualifications.”

Under the new plan, students would no longer be obliged to wait for those scheduled exams but undertake them as when they feel they are ready.

Online exams

Due to Covid-19, Kasneb suspended its May exams. However, it is working on a plan to offer them in November or early December. Before that, it will conduct a survey among the students to establish those who are ready and have the resources to do the exams online.

The idea is to eliminate backlog, where the organisations will have to deal with accumulated number of students post-Covid.

Dr Letting said the Covid-19 disruption had pushed educational and training institutions to change their programmes and especially modes of delivery, with emphasis being flexibility and convenience. Learning has shifted from the traditional face-to-face and time-bound programmes to learner-based.

In view of that, Kasneb is planning to review syllabus for all the programmes it offers to reflect the emerging reality. Given the emerging threats to businesses, Kasneb professional courses will be reviewed to include organisational risk management, contingency planning and enhanced digital skills.

Moreover, the professional programmes will incorporate communication and soft skills taking cognisance of the fact that the dynamics of the workplace are changing and the trend is towards relational and collaborative engagements.

Dr Letting says Kasneb is putting a lot of emphasis on quality and to that extent, the organisation regularly monitors how its accredited institutions offer teaching and learning programmes.

In line with the ongoing changes in the country’s education and training sector, Kasneb is adapting to competency based education (CBE) model of learning which focuses on what students learn and competencies gained as opposed to the credit hours attained.

Broadly, the entire education sector is going through reforms. At the tertiary level, the Ministry of Education has developed Competency Based Education and Training (CBET) that is designed to meet the demands of industry and business. The thrust of this is training individuals to be able to perform to the standards required in employment, in an agreed range of contexts, repeatedly over time.

Practical components

This is in tandem with the Competency Based Curriculum (CBC), whose objective is to equip learners with skills and competences. It is a marked departure from the current curriculum that puts emphasis on knowledge acquisition rather than the practical components. It is this orientation that has informed Kasneb new thinking.

Dr Letting says that Kasneb has entered into partnership with the Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Service (KUCCPS) to select and place students into its programmes. Consequent to that, those placed by KUCCPS are eligible to get loans and bursaries from the Higher Education Loans Board (Helb). That is a boon. Learners seeking professional qualifications can secure funding to pursue courses of their choice.