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Full
Length Research Paper
Safety awareness and preparedness in secondary schools in
Kenya: A case of Turkana district
Ronoh Richard Kipngeno and Kyalo Wambua Benjamin*
Moi University,
P.O. Box 3900, Eldoret, Kenya.
*Corresponding
author. E-mail:
kyalo_w@yahoo.com. Tel: +254722822533.
Accepted 4 August, 2009
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Safety for
students and staff from hazards that can be created by
unsafe conditions, behaviour, disasters or emergencies in
schools cannot be guaranteed. This is because of inadequate
preparedness and awareness programs for safety needs. This
study investigated the adequacy of procedures, precautions
and infrastructure to respond to fire outbreaks and
destructive violence with a view to making recommendations
for improving safety conditions in schools in Kenya. The
study adopted a survey research design in which a random
sample of 210 respondents was drawn from seven secondary
schools in Turkana District, Kenya. They included students,
head teachers, teachers, non-teaching staff, community
members and key informants. Observation method was used to
complement interviews in data collection. The data collected
were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential
statistics. The findings showed that there were no awareness
programs of school safety needs in Turkana District;
teachers and students were poorly prepared to respond to
fire outbreak and destructive violence. Based on these
findings, the Schools should be advised to conduct fire
drills and talks periodically in order to improve the level
of awareness on school safety needs; the schools should also
conduct training of staff and students on how to prevent
violence in order to improve preparedness; schools should
not over depend on reactive policies and legislation at the
expense of pro-active programs that seek to involve other
stakeholders like community in management of students’
discipline. The findings of the study and their implications
will assist the teachers, students, parents and educational
managers in policy guidelines on school safety.
Key words:
Safety, awareness, preparedness, policies, legislations. |
