Quality assurance in ecdc monitoring and funding for early childhood development education in bungoma south district, kenya

The study sought to determine the relationship between policy framework governing ECDE and actual practices in Early Childhood Development Centres (ECDCs) in Bungoma South District, Kenya. This paper examines whether or not the ECDCs were monitored according to the quality assurance standards, how ECDCs in the District were funded and how allocation and accounting was done. A total of 40 ECDCs was used, all of whose head teachers participated. The teachers were selected through simple random sampling. Data was collected using questionnaires, interview and observation schedules, and analysed using descriptive statistics. Majority of the ECDE programmes were run and funded by parents while few were funded by the management and directors of the ECDE centres. The funding was not reliable. The funds management challenges included lost receipts, parents miscalculating balances, insufficient funds and poor fees payments. As such, there was no significant relationship between the policy framework governing ECDE programme in Kenya and practices in ECDCs in the District. The study recommended increase in the number of QASOs in ECDCs, extension of Free Primary Education (FPE) Programme to ECDE to reduce financial challenges, and review the education act to cater for trained ECDE teachers among others.