Several studies have been done to establish the effect of the re-entry policy and students’ retention. A study done by Okwany and Kamusiime (2017) revealed that despite the re-entry policy in Ghana, young mothers are still out of school unable to continue their primary and secondary education. The reintegration education policies for pregnant school girls who leave school purposely for child birth have not been realized as most of these girls remain home. Scholars suggest that stigmatization against pregnant school girls and young mothers is a significant factor influencing the decision of young mothers never to return to school after child birth ( Birungi et al., 2015 ).

In Tanzania, the government introduced a re-entry policy in 2021, allowing mother students who dropped out of school due to pregnancy to return ( United republic of Tanzania, 2021 ). However, there was some political interference towards this plan, which impacted its implementation and effectiveness. Studies by Momsen (2019) and Erete et al. (2021) highlighted the pervasive sexual oppression and violence faced by girl children in these domains. This oppression creates an environment where some girls find themselves vulnerable to early pregnancies leading to detrimental consequences such as dropping out of school.

Thwala et al. (2022) found out that re-engaging teenage girls who have left school due to pregnancy involves actively reintegrating these young mothers back into formal education, providing support, tailored programs and a welcoming environment to empower them to continue with their studies and pursue their educational goals. It entails identifying and removing the obstacles that contributed to their disengagement, creating effective interventions to encourage their return and giving them the tools and encouragement they need to continue their education ( Kubek et al., 2020 ).

Marende (2022) established that schools were yet to succeed with re-entry policy because only 16% of girls who took maternity leave from schools reenrolled after child birth. The study recommends for teacher training on psycho social support for teenage mothers and school support on acquisition of bursaries and parental empowerment for involvement in the academic pursuit of teenage mothers.

A study done in Narok by Azumah et al. (2022) revealed that the implementation and manner of implementation of the re-entry policy is at the discretion of head teachers. The study pointed at the failure of the policy to account for the significant amount of time lost while trying to catch up with their studies upon their return. Chiyota and Marishane (2020) emphasized the nation benefits of girls’ education, referring to research that shows that educating females produces far reaching profits for girls and women themselves, their families and the societies in which they live. He further remarked that indeed, during his tenure as a chief economist of the world bank he became persuaded that once all the benefits are acknowledged, investment in the education of girls may well be the highest profit venture obtainable in the developing world.

Mulenga and Mukaba (2018) found that schools did not have specific programs meant to help re-entered girls and that most girls decided to stop schooling. According to Musili et al. (2020) most of the teenage mothers come from poor back grounds that could not offer basic needs for the mother and her baby. In Kenya most principals were reported to have no adequate experience in the proper implementation of the readmission policy of girls after teenage pregnancy in public secondary schools ( Musili et al., 2020 ).

Omondi & Onyango (2008) report that school heads fear allowing the return to school of girls who give birth because of the stigma associated with having mothers in a student environment. Omondi & Onyango (2008) observed that at the launch of the report on teenage pregnancy and school girl dropout, school heads talked of ostracism faced by schools who have implemented the ministry of education policy on readmitting the girls who give birth in the same school. Omondi & Onyango (2008) noted that other schools derogatorily refer to institutions that accept teenage mothers as “maternity schools” and openly encouraged isolation of our girls in social gatherings.

This study employed a descriptive research design. Descriptive research design is a method for gathering information about a population, situation or phenomenon to describe it accurately and systematically.

The study had a population of 5122 participants. The study population included 50 headteachers, 50 deputy headteachers and 5022 form three and four students of the fifty public secondary schools in Masinga sub-county. The researcher chose form three and four students because they had spent a considerable time in the school and so were information rich.

The sample size for the students was computed using Yamane 1973 formula as follows:

n = $\frac{N}{1+N{\left(e\right)}^2}$

n = sample size;

N = population size;

e = margin error (0.05);

1 = constant.

Hence,

n = $\frac{5022}{1+500{\left(0.05\right)}^2}$

= 370.

Sampling is a method, process or procedure used to select a subset of a population to take part in the study. It is the process of choosing a large number people for a research in a way that ensures the chosen people accurately reflect the larger population from which they were chosen ( Matula et al., 2018 ). This study used purposive sampling technique to select 25 deputy headteacher and 25 headteachers. The researcher further employed simple random sampling to select 370 students.

The researcher made use of three instruments to collect data from the headteachers, deputy headteachers and the students. These included questionnaires, interview guides and document analysis. This approach enabled the researcher to gather both qualitative and quantitative data.

Validity assess whether content in a questionnaire is able to measure what is intended to be measured ( Orodho, 2004 ). For this study, departmental supervisors examined the content validity of the questionnaire then provided the researcher with the necessary advice. According to Mugenda (2008) , reliability is a measure of the degree to which a research instrument yields consistent results or data after repeated trials. The study applied the test retest method to establish the reliability of the items in the questionnaire. The reliability coefficient was computed using Pearson’s product moments correlation. The questionnaires had a correlation coefficient of 0.70 which was considered acceptable ( Mugenda & Mugenda, 2003 ).

Data analysis deals with working with the data breaking and synthesizing in search of patterns and attempting to discover what the important issues are ( Babu-Nyarko, 2019 ). Data analysis was done using SPSS (statistical package for social sciences) version 22.0. Descriptive statistics including frequencies, means and percentages summarized demographic characteristics and key variables.

The National Council of Science, Technology and Innovation (NACOST) as well as university of Nairobi provided permission for the study. Permission was also sought from the County Commissioner Machakos County and sub-county director of education Masinga Sub-county. The researcher ensured voluntary participation by the respondents and assured them of the confidentiality of the information collected.

A total of 370 questionnaires were administered to students while 25 questionnaires were administered to the headteachers. Only 350 questionnaires were returned for analysis by the students which formed 95% return rate. Similarly, 25 out of 25 headteachers and deputy headteachers responded hence a response rate of 100%. The questionnaire return rate is shown in Table 1 below.

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

Demographic characteristics of the respondents

The researcher analyzed the demographic characteristics of the headteachers and deputy headteachers.

Data displaying the distribution of headteachers and deputy headteachers by age is summarized in Table 2 .

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

Table 2 shows that majority 9 (37.5%) of the head teachers are aged between 40 and 44 years while 8 (29.2%) are aged between 45 - 49 years. 3 (12.5%) are aged 50 - 55 years. Richter (2011) asserted that teachers between the ages 30 - 49 years are keen on trying new ideas, have hope in the system and aggressively seek to produce results and are likely to be appointed for leadership. The implication here is that majority of the headteachers were in the right age to implement the girls’ re-entry policy because they were keen on trying new ideas. The deputy head teachers were equally of the right age to implement the re-entry policy.

As shown in Table 3 , the study sought to establish the gender of the respondents.

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

As shown in Table 3 , majority of the headteachers 19 (76%) were male while 6 (24%) were female. In addition, majority of the deputy head teachers 16 (64%) were male while 9 (36%) were female. The gender ratio clearly show that more males were appointed in positions of leadership as compared to the females. In contrast there were more female students 200 (57.2%) as compared to the male students 150 (42.8%)

Data displaying qualifications of headteachers and deputy head teachers is summarized in Table 4 .

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

The findings in Table 4 indicate that majority 16 (66.7%) of the Head Teachers were degree holders while 6 (25%) were master’s holders. 20 (83.3%) of the deputy headteachers had attained a degree while 2 (8.3%) had attained a master’s degree. The implication here is that majority of the head Teachers and the Deputy headteachers had the necessary qualifications of a degree in education for effective implementation of the re-entry policy secondary schools.

Headteachers had been asked to state whether they were aware of the re-entry policy. Their responses are presented in Figure 1 .

Findings in Figure 1 indicate that majority 80% of the headteachers knew that there was a governments re-entry policy for teen mothers. Conversely 20% of the headteachers had never heard about the policy, or rather they gathered through media that expectant students and teen mothers should be supported to complete secondary education.

The headteachers responded on the number of girls retained in school from 2018 to 2023. Their responses are shown in Table 5 .

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

Findings in Table 5 indicate that majority of the expectant students were retained to continue with school. This implies that the re-entry policy by the government of Kenya had a positive impact on retention of expectant students. These findings are in agreement with Imbosa et al. (2022) who found out that the re-entry policy was a major positive step towards achieving retention of expectant and parenting students.

The headteachers were requested to rate the effectiveness of the re-entry policy on student’s retention. Their responses are shown on Table 6 .

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

Majority 18 (72%) of headteachers indicated that re-entry policy was effective in increasing girls’ retention while 3 (12%) indicated that the re-entry policy was very effective. In addition, 4 (16%) indicated that the re-entry policy was less effective in increasing students’ retention.

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

To test whether relationship existed between effective implementation of the government re-entry policy, the following null hypothesis was formulated as follows.

HO₁: there is no significant relationship between implementation of the girls’ re-entry policy by the headteachers and students’ retention. The hypothesis was analyzed using Pearson correlation and the results are as given in Table 7 .

Source: fieldwork, 2022.

Correlation is significant at 0.01 level (2-tailed)

Results in Table 7 show that there is a significant strong correlation between effective implementation of government re-entry policy by the headteachers and students’ retention (r (23) = 0.76, P = 0.00).

Null hypothesis was rejected and an alternative hypothesis adopted. This suggests that increase in effective implementation of government re-entry policy by the headteachers will lead to increase in retention rates. These findings are supported by Kearney et al. (2019) who found out that the re-entry policy has a positive impact on the girls’ education. Kearney reported that South Africa had succeeded in implementing the re-entry policy by providing social and financial support for teenage mothers and access to various contraceptive methods. Prakash et al. (2019) established that the re-entry policy in India prospered due to targeted support offered by most learning institutions to teenage mothers during pregnancy and after child birth.

Webber (2018) established that 70% of the teenage mothers still do not participate in school after child birth due to inadequate support from community, negative self-image and stigmatization.