The Kenya National Examination Council (Knec) revealed new rules that all candidates and their teachers will have to comply with.
In a marked departure from previous years, examination booklets will be dispatched to schools this month for centre managers to check if the materials are adequate ahead of the scheduled dates.
The materials will be distributed to sub-county directors of education who will issue them to centre managers, supervisors and invigilators in a new plan to beat last minute confusion.
Examination question papers and related materials will be dispatched from the Knec offices to the distribution points a few days to the start.
This year, unlike the practice previously, all question papers will not be kept in staff rooms or any other place other than the examination rooms in the full glare of candidates, invigilators, security and supervisors.
Reports revealed that the decision was arrived at after claims that some schools had established command centres to access and leak examination material.
Under the arrangement, some schools are alleged to have planned to open examination papers in an elaborate plan involving invigilators, school heads and security officers.
Knec warned that no question papers will be opened before the scheduled time and that invigilators and teachers are not allowed to write examinations for any candidates at any given time.
Knec Chief Executive Officer Mercy Karogo issued a brief which will be discussed during the week-long regional meetings that will bring together Ministry of Education officials, regional security officers and all school heads.
The centre managers should not give lunch or fare to monitoring officers and any officers who demand the same should be reported to Knec additionally the examination body also warned that centre managers should not demand money from parents/guardians to entertain school guests who may include Knec monitoring officers.
Cautioned was also issued to sub-county directors to ensure no conflict of interest exists when deploying invigilators and supervisors. This means that examination officials may be posted to supervise examinations away from their sub-counties.
TSC sub-county Directors provided names of the 2018 KCPE and KCSE supervisors and invigilators which were sent to TSC for vetting and the approved supervisors and invigilators will be sent to back for deployment.
Knec announced it has installed an additional 40 containers, bringing to 459 the total number of strong safes. Four security officers will be deployed to man a container on a 24-hour basis.
