Influence Of Donor Partners Funding Initiatives on Provision of Physical Infrastructure in Public Secondary Schools in Murang’a County, Kenya

Government investment and leadership provide long-lasting solutions to the huge challenges facing our societies. However, over the past two to three decades, it has become clear that private participation unleashes the power of certain market mechanisms that can break down challenges to access. The donor partner has a crucial role to play in physical infrastructure development in its ability to provide innovations in financing and technical solutions in these projects in schools. Private players must be offered incentives to develop these projects and must be brought in as authentic development partners – along with government. However, funding of education especially at secondary level still remains contentious as seen in many calls by the public and even the government to reduce the burden on parents in terms of funding. Secondary schools have since asked for Ksh 9 billion for infrastructure development from the current Ksh. 1.5 billion, which the MOE agreed is inadequate (MOE, 2019). Murang’a County recorded the highest transition rate at 107.66 percent, with the introduction of 100 percent transition, having expected 25,313 students but ended up enrolling 26,720 students (MOE, 2023) this study therefore, assessed the influence of donor partners funding initiatives on provision of physical infrastructure in public secondary schools. This was achieved by establishing the funding practices by donor. The study used the descriptive survey research design which focused on summarizing and describing the main features of the data set. The target population consisted of 310 school principals, 3720 teachers and 8 sub-county directors of Education. Data collection was done using questionnaires, observation and interview schedules. Stratified sampling was employed to ensure representation of all categories of public secondary schools. From the selected schools, principals and teachers were respondents in this study. While data analysis was done using descriptive statistics, in regards to adequacy of physical infrastructure funding. The national government funding initiatives have provided adequate physical infrastructure as compared with other funding models. Therefore, Majority (68.8%) of the respondents disagreed that donor funding has influenced the provision of physical infrastructure, with only (31.2%) agreeing. The study established that funding initiatives from donor partners had a positive correlation with provision of physical infrastructure in public secondary schools in Murang’a County. The findings will be useful to policy makers in terms of making informed decisions that will guide the government on provision of physical infrastructure in public secondary schools in Kenya.