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It’s no longer a secret that under Kenya’s education reforms, the 8-4-4 form is done away with slowly to pay the way for the full adoption of the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC), which is already in motion. Therefore, in 2025, particularly for the Grade 9 learners, there will be no more Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) as this has been replaced with the Kenya Junior School Education Assessment (KJSEA) exams, which marks the end of junior secondary education (Grades 7-9) and serves as a transition point to senior secondary school (Grades 10-12) under the new CBC curriculum.Â
However, like all school examinations in Kenya, the KJSEA exams are also administered by the Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) and must be done by all candidates before they proceed to the next phase of their studies. These examinations, unlike KCPE, focus on assessing how well learners are familiar with the core subjects with a 60% grade, while the rest of the 40% comes from the School-Based Assessments (SBAs), scoring the final grade out of 100%. The KJSEA also introduces two papers per core subject, such as English (Language and Composition) and Mathematics (Paper 1 and Paper 2), to comprehensively evaluate theoretical knowledge and applied skills.
If you are a Grade 6 learner, parent, teacher, or even school head wondering when the KJSEA 2025 exams will start, the official KJSEA timetable is out, and this guide will walk you through everything you need to know.
Key Dates and Subjects in the 2025 KJSEA Timetable
The 2025 examination period will officially start on October 27 and end on November 5, 2025, with each day dedicated to a specific paper. But before data, there is a mid-year Series examination meant for project-based only for Creative Arts & Sports, which will begin in May and end in July 2025, and Pretechnical Studies, which is also scheduled for July 2025.
All the Mandatory papers in the former KCPE exams, which are now KJSEA Core papers, are mandatory for all students. They include English, Kiswahili, Mathematics, Integrated Science (theory and practical), and Religious Education (CRE, IRE, or HRE).
Below is the Full KJSEA timetable for the year 2025, along with the Key dates of specific papers:
If a candidate can not abide by the rules above, it can lead to exam cancellation for the subject, which will also affect your overall grade. If it is the entire exam center, the results of all the whole schools can also be canceled. In addition to that, the Criminal penalties for the candidate or anyone involved with exam irregularities are as follows:
Up to 10 years imprisonment or a 2 million shilling fine for leaking exam content
Up to 5 years imprisonment or a 5 million shilling fine for damaging exam materials
Up to 2 years imprisonment or a 2 million shilling fine for impersonation, plus a 3-year ban from KNEC exams
These rules above are just the tip of the iceberg; you can download the KJSEA PDF, which as all the rules for candidates, supervisors, and schools to understand what is expected from each personnel.
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