200 Egerton Engineering Graduates Forced to Return to School

Around 200 engineering graduates from Egerton University will be required to undertake remedial classes from September 2022 to receive accreditation from the Engineers Board of Kenya.

It is the latest chapter in the accreditation fiasco that started with the board’s refusal to accredit engineering graduates from Egerton’s 2019 class citing gaps in their curriculum content. They pursued Bachelor of Science in Water and Environmental Engineering (WEEN).

EBK maintained that it had not given the requisite certifications for the program. The graduates, who found themselves locked out of employment opportunities began lobbying various institutions to intervene, among them Parliament.

On Thursday, March 10, Egerton Vice-Chancellor Isaac Kibwage told a National Assembly committee that they had engaged EBK to align course requirements. The graduates will therefore have to undertake eight units in a special semester.

The units include Geotechnical Engineering, Structural Masonry Design, Highway Geometry Design, Pavement Design and Foundation Engineering. This will bridge the gap to fulfilling EBK requirements for Bachelor of Science in Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEEN).

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“The University will invite the graduates to register for one special semester to cover the eight units at no extra cost,” Kibwage noted.

He further stated that there will be a total of three special semesters from September to ensure all the graduates are able to clear.

EBK Registrar Margaret Ongai reiterated the body’s position that it would not certify graduates who undertook unaccredited courses. She noted that they were reviewing an accreditation request for CEEN by Egerton University.

“The students who have taken the unaccredited programmes cannot be registered by the Board, thus missing out on employment opportunities,” she stated.

EBK’s rejection of degrees from institutions including Egerton and Pwani University has in recent years sparked debate on the state of Kenyan higher learning, with critics claiming cash-grabs by top institutions are to blame for derailing students’ lives.

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