Influence of School Funding on Quality Education in Public Primary Schools in Machakos County, Kenya

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the influence of school funding on quality education in public primary schools in Machakos County, Kenya. Objective of this paper was to explore the influence of school funding on quality education in public primary schools in Machakos County, Kenya. The study adopted descriptive research design approach and the population was 403 head teachers, 2015 teachers and 756 standard 8 pupils from public primary schools located in rural areas. A sample size of 343 respondents was selected through purposive sampling and simple random sampling. Primary data was collected using questionnaires which were issued to teachers who taught standard 8. Focus Group Discussions were conducted by standard 8 pupils while the researcher carried out document analysis after head teachers filled forms containing school related records. Descriptive analysis was used, and this included means, standard deviation, relative frequencies and percentages. A computer software programme, Statistical Package for Social Scientist (SPSS) version 26.0 was used to generate data array that was used for subsequent analysis of the data. Inferential statistics using regression model was applied to examine the relationship between the research variables. The study findings revealed that a change in school funding led to a significant change in quality education in public primary schools in Machakos County, Kenya. The conclusion drawn from the study is that there was a linear positive relationship between school funding, and quality education. The study recommends that; Ministry of Education (MOE) to increase the capitation of Free Primary Education (FPE) funds and disburse it on time and parents or guardians to provide financial support to meet hidden expenses which are not catered for by FPE.