Policy on safety of school children 196. Towards the realisation of the set goals, the Government has developed various interventional strategies to ensure safe and secure school environments. This strategy arises from the strong conviction that: Safe and secure school environments facilitate and foster quality teaching and learning in educational institutions. Safety, especially in schools, is even more critical given the fact that young children are vulnerable to insecurity. In insecure school environments, delinquency, truancy and absenteeism, especially among girls, are common. When teaching and learning is interrupted by acts of violence among learners, through ethnic or land clashes, cattle rustling, cultural practices such as female genital mutilation, learner performance in national examinations is inevitably compromised. Comprehensive school safety is, therefore, fundamental to school success and learner achievement. The Government’s commitment to the promotion of access, equity, participation, retention, completion and quality at school level of education is bound to be affected if safety and security concerns are not addressed fully. 197. School Safety has been recognized as an integral and indispensable component of the teaching and learning process. The Government constantly brings out the obligation of educational stakeholders to foster safe and secure school environments to facilitate increased learner enrolment, retention and completion and hence attainment and quality education. In this respect, School Management Committee/Board of Governors members, the head teacher, teachers, learners, parents and other stakeholders have important roles to play in facilitating and enhancing safety in schools. Nonetheless, the direct responsibility of overseeing school safety should fall within a specific School Safety Committees which are usually put to task whenever a safety issue in any school occurs. 198. According to the latest Demographic and Health Survey, 2008/2009 data, 40% of Kenyan adolescent girls without any education are either pregnant or have already become mothers. For those who have completed primary education 26% are mothers compared to only 8% of those with secondary education or higher. Women with higher levels of education have fewer children than those with lower or no education at all. 199. One of the factors contributing to school girl drop out and consequently affecting the education attainment of girls is teenage pregnancy and related consequences. Recognizing the negative impact of teenage pregnancy on girls’ education, the Ministry of Education put in place the return to School Policy Guideline sin the mid-1990s to ensure that girls who became pregnant while still in school got a second chance. The implementation of the guidelines has however been hindered by range of challenges including negative perceptions from the community, stigma and lack of awareness at various levels. 200. Other policies measures that the State has put in place that touch on the right to education include:a) Policy on HIV with interventions against stigma and education b) Gender parity in institutions of learning c) Service Charter and Citizens delivery charters on education d) Affirmative Action for the girl child, lower the university entry marks for girls. e) The conversation of provincial secondary schools into centres of excellence (national schools) 45