NAIROBI, Kenya Oct 8 – The Ministry of Education has admitted it cannot establish the true scale of teenage pregnancies among school-going girls or determine how many teachers have been implicated in the cases, citing gaps in its data collection and reporting systems.Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba told the Senate on Wednesday that the ministry lacks a comprehensive system for collecting and consolidating information on pregnancies among learners and the alleged perpetrators.Ogamba said the ministry largely relies on school heads and teachers to identify and report cases, a system he acknowledged has significant shortcomings.“At present, the ministry does not have a comprehensive framework and information management system to aggregate data on reported pregnancies and perpetrators,” he said.The CS said some school heads were also reluctant to disclose information, making it difficult for the government to establish the extent of teenage pregnancies and cases involving teachers.“Some school heads are hesitant to give information for fear of exposing secrets and weaknesses,” he said.Ogamba was responding to questions by nominated Senator Catherine Mumma, who had sought detailed data on teenage pregnancies recorded in 2023 and 2024.Ms Mumma wanted the ministry to provide the number of affected learners in every county and sub-county, as well as the number of cases involving teachers.She also sought information on defilement cases arising from pregnancies identified within the school system, including the number that had been prosecuted.But Ogamba said the ministry could not provide the requested figures because there was no system linking information held by schools with disciplinary bodies and criminal justice agencies.He said determining whether a person was a perpetrator required coordination between the Ministry of Education, Teachers Service Commission, National Police Service, Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Judiciary.“Designation as a perpetrator necessarily implies that a disciplinary or criminal justice process has been concluded with a finding against the suspect,” he said.The admission exposes a major gap in the government’s efforts to address teenage pregnancies, particularly where learners may have been abused by people entrusted with their education and protection.Ogamba said the government was now working to establish a system that would enable different agencies to share information on teenage pregnancies, perpetrators and the action taken against them.Health data fills gapWith the Education ministry unable to provide comprehensive figures, Mr Ogamba said the government was relying on data from the health sector to gauge the scale of teenage pregnancies.He told senators that the Kenya Health Information System recorded 110,821 pregnancies among adolescents aged 10 to 19 in the first five months of 2023.Of these, 6,110 involved girls aged 10 to 14, while 104,711 involved adolescents aged 15 to 19.The CS also cited 2022 data showing that the national teenage pregnancy rate among girls aged 15 to 19 stood at 14.8 per cent.Samburu had the highest rate at 50.1 per cent, followed by West Pokot at 36.3 per cent, Marsabit at 29.4 per cent, Narok at 28.1 per cent and Meru at 23.6 per cent.Other counties with rates significantly above the national figure included Homa Bay at 23.2 per cent, Migori at 22.4 per cent, Kajiado at 21.8 per cent and Siaya at 20.9 per cent.The figures, however, do not specifically show how many of the pregnancies involved girls who were actively enrolled in school at the time.No clear data on child mothers returning to schoolThe ministry also acknowledged that it does not have comprehensive information showing how many teenage mothers have returned to school after giving birth or how many have failed to resume their education.Ogamba said the Kenya Education Management Information System (KEMIS) had been designed to capture such information going forward.The gap is significant given that government policy provides for pregnant learners and teenage mothers to continue their education.Under the National Guidelines for School Re-entry in Early Learning and Basic Education, school heads are required to re-admit teenage mothers unconditionally after childbirth.The guidelines also allow learners to transfer to other schools if they face stigma or discrimination in their former institutions.Despite the policy, Ogamba said many young mothers continue to struggle to return to school.“Lack of a robust and accessible childcare support system is a major obstacle,” he said.He said childcare responsibilities often resulted in lateness and absenteeism, while poverty, stigma and discrimination further increased the likelihood of young mothers abandoning their education.The ministry also identified limited awareness among teenage mothers, parents and communities about the right of young mothers to resume schooling as another barrier.Pregnancy a major trigger for school dropoutOgamba said the ministry had not conducted its own comprehensive study on the causes and patterns of teenage pregnancy, instead relying on research undertaken by other government agencies and development partners.He said available studies indicate that pregnancy is the critical event preceding school dropout for 66 per cent of girls who leave school, while 93 per cent of the pregnancies are unintended.The CS attributed teenage pregnancies to a combination of social and economic factors, including poverty, inadequate access to sexual and reproductive health information, early sexual debut, weak parental guidance, alcohol and drug abuse, sexual and gender-based violence and negative peer pressure.The disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic also had a lasting impact on girls’ education.Ogamba said girls who stayed out of school for six months during the Covid-19 lockdown faced twice the risk of becoming pregnant and three times the risk of dropping out of school.The ministry is now seeking to strengthen its information systems and coordination with other government agencies to enable it to track pregnancies among learners, identify alleged perpetrators and monitor whether teenage mothers return to school.For senators, however, the lack of comprehensive education-sector data means the government still cannot say with certainty how many schoolgirls have become pregnant, where the cases occurred, how many involved teachers or what became of the resulting investigations.