Top 2018 KCSE student gets admission to MIT

The student who emerged number three countrywide in the 2018 Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) has been admitted to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States.

Edwin Otieno Ouko, who was a student at the Light Academy Boys’ secondary school in Nairobi, scored a mean of 87.363 the 2018 KCSE.

In a recent post by Light Academy, Edwin is set to join MIT to further his studies. The exact date of admission is however not known.

According to Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) World University rankings, MIT was named the World’s Top University in 2019.

After completing his Kenyan Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) in 2014, where he scored 401 marks out of 500, Edwin almost got into depression since he lacked fees to join a secondary school.

He could not join the Homa Bay High School as his father was bedridden and the mother living in desolate at their home in Kabondo.

Edwin’s relatives contributed some money to enable them to travel to Light Academy and try their luck to get the student a scholarship.

Ismael Kucuk, the headmaster of Light Academy, said that despite Edwin not scoring 430 marks, which was the cutoff mark to get a scholarship, his story touched him.

Edwin later joined the school two months after the other students had resumed their studies.

Despite the fee challenges he faced when getting to high school, Edwin beat the odds to become a top student.