Since the introduction of FPE, the concern by the Government of Kenya and other stakeholders in education has been education access and retention. This study sought to investigate the influence of socio-economic factors on access and retention of learners in public primary schools in Turkana West Sub-County. The study was guided by Classical Liberal Theory of Equal Opportunity and Social Darwinism. Exploratory research design was adopted in this study. The study targeted 36 head teachers, 201 teachers, 13221 parents and 22028 pupils from public primary schools in Turkana west Sub County bringing the total population to 35486 people. Stratified sampling was used to select 393 pupils while purposive sampling was used to select 12 teachers, 12 parents and 12 head teachers from the sampled schools. The research instruments used for data collection consisted of questionnaires and interview schedules. The instruments were validated. Piloting of the instruments was conducted in two primary schools in the neighboring sub county (Loima sub-county) each of the instrument yielded a reliability coefficient of above 0.7 using the split- half technique. Questionnaires were used to collect quantitative data from pupils while interview schedules were used to collect qualitative data from teachers, parents and head teachers. Data collected was cleaned, coded and then entered into SPSS version 22.0 for analysis. Quantitative data was analysed using frequencies and percentages while qualitative data was presented in prose in accordance to the study objectives. The study adhered to all ethical considerations in research to ensure that the results are not jeopardized. The study found that socio-economic factors have a significant positive influence on access and retention of learners in public primary schools in Turkana West Sub-County.
Access, Learners, Retention, Socio-Economic Factors
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