Girls outperform boys in 2025 KJSEA results
Candidates from St Mary's Girls Comprehensive and Junior School in Nakuru County on October 27, 2025.
What you need to know:
- The CS said the widest gender gap was observed in Kiswahili.
- A total of 1,130,459 learners sat for the KJSEA exams.
Girls outperformed boys in the 2025 Kenya Junior School Education Assessment (KJSEA) exams whose results were announced Thursday.
Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba revealed that female learners outperformed their male counterparts in 10 of the 12 subjects.
The CS said the widest gender gap was observed in Kiswahili at 64.86 percent versus 51.4 percent followed by CRE at 59.77 percent versus 48.39 percent. He said the gap between English stood at 52.82 percent versus 48.45 percent and Social Studies at 62.89 versus 54.35 percent.
“Of concern, however, are Mathematics and the Kenyan Sign Language, which recorded 32.44 and 22.14 percent of the learners performing at Meeting and Exceeding Expectations, respectively,” said Mr Ogamba.
A total of 1.1 million learners sat for the KJSEA exams. Of this, 578,630 were male (51.19 percent), while 551,829 (48.81) percent were female.
The counties that registered the highest number of learners for KJSEA were Nairobi (71,022), Kakamega (59,384) and Nakuru (54,028).
41 counties had a significant entry of more male than female candidates, while Mombasa County is the only county that achieved a gender parity of 50 percent for male and female learners.
Isiolo, Nairobi, Samburu, Marsabit and West Pokot had a significant entry of more female than male candidates.
Preference for STEM
The CS said more than half of candidates (59.09 percent) have demonstrated potential to pursue the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) pathway at Senior School, Social Science 46.52 percent and Art/Sports Pathway 48.73 percent.
About 75 percent of learners performed at Approaching Expectations (AE) and above across all subjects.
Creative Arts and Sports registered the strongest performance with 96.84 percent of learners attaining Approaching Expectations and above, followed by Agriculture (96.24 percent), Kiswahili (93.11 percent), and Social Studies (92.93 percent) respectively.
An Approaching Expectation grade is sufficient for learners to progress to senior school pathways that require basic competencies in the subject area.
The CS said earners will be placed to senior schools based on their performance and selected pathway.
“In line with the recommendation by the Presidential Working Party on Education Reform, the assessment of learners at Grade 9 shall comprise 20 percent from the Kenya Primary School Education Assessment, 20 percent from School Based Assessment in 17 Grades 7 and 8, and 60 percent Summative Evaluation at Grade 9,” said Mr Ogamba.
All Grade 10 learners will be expected to report to their respective Senior Schools starting January 12, 2026.
