CBC Report Card Templates for Kenyan schools.

A CBC report card in Kenya must show the learner's competency level — Exceeding, Meeting, Approaching, or Below Expectation — for each strand of each learning area, not a percentage ranking against the class. That single rule is what makes a CBC report fundamentally different from the 8-4-4 reports most Kenyan parents grew up with, and it's the thing schools most often get wrong when they redesign their templates.

This guide is for the deputy head or curriculum lead who has to issue CBC reports this term and wants a structure that works. It covers what must be on the report, how to design one the class teacher can actually fill out, the KNEC end-of-grade format, and a free template you can copy.

What must be on every CBC report

Every CBC report card must include the learner's identification, the assessment period, the strands and sub-strands per learning area with competency levels, formative and summative scores, attendance, class teacher comments, head teacher comments and the school stamp.

The non-negotiables, in the order they should appear:

• School block — school name, address, phone, email, logo. This is the parent's proof of authenticity.
• Learner block — full name, admission number, grade, stream, class teacher, term, year.
• Attendance — days present out of days possible. Short, prominent.
• Learning areas — for each one: the strands assessed, sub-strands within them, formative assessment score, summative assessment score, overall competency level.
• Class teacher comment — specific, behaviour-and-effort focused, not generic ("works well in groups, needs to revise area-and-perimeter strand").
• Head teacher comment — broader, forward-looking.
• Next-term focus — 2–3 named strands the learner should work on. CBC is competency-based — naming what to improve next term is the whole point.
• Signatures and stamp — class teacher, head teacher, parent acknowledgement line, school stamp.

The four competency levels, explained

CBC uses four competency levels — Exceeding Expectation, Meeting Expectation, Approaching Expectation, and Below Expectation — to describe what a learner can do against the strand outcomes. They are not synonyms for A, B, C, D.

• Exceeding Expectation (E.E.) — the learner can do everything the strand specifies and apply it to novel situations.
• Meeting Expectation (M.E.) — the learner can do everything the strand specifies in familiar contexts.
• Approaching Expectation (A.E.) — the learner can do parts of the strand with support.
• Below Expectation (B.E.) — the learner needs significant scaffolding to engage with the strand.

How CBC differs from 8-4-4

8-4-4 reports were percentage-based and ranked learners against the class. CBC reports are competency-based and describe what each learner can do against defined outcomes. They do not rank.

Practically:

• No class position. CBC reports do not show "Position 3 of 42." The parent's question shifts from "how does my child compare?" to "what can my child do?"
• Strand-level granularity. Maths is no longer "78%". It's "M.E. in Numbers, M.E. in Measurement, A.E. in Geometry."
• Formative and summative are both reported. Continuous assessment is now visible to the parent, not just the end-of-term exam.
• Comments are more important. Without a percentage, the class teacher's specific comment carries the message.

A clean CBC report template you can copy

Below is a minimum-viable CBC report card structure. Schools using Owldid Systems generate this automatically from the marks book. Schools building it in Word or InDesign can copy the layout directly.

The KNEC end-of-grade format

At the end of Grade 3, 6 and 9 (KCSE entry from Grade 12), KNEC's standardized national assessment results are appended to the school's term-end report. Schools must include the KNEC scores verbatim and cannot substitute internal grades.

Three things to get right:

• KNEC scores are reported as raw bands. Not as percentages or ranks.
• The KNEC section is separate. Place it on its own page or clearly bordered block — never blended with the school's internal marks.
• Don't editorialise. Class teacher comments belong on the school report. The KNEC block is the council's voice, not the school's.

How Owldid Systems generates this automatically

Owldid captures strand and sub-strand marks as the class teacher enters them throughout the term. At end-of-term, the report card prints itself — the class teacher only writes the personal comment.

The flow:

1. The class teacher enters formative scores week-by-week against the strand schema for the grade.
2. The deputy enters summative end-of-term scores.
3. Owldid auto-calculates the competency level per strand using the school's threshold mapping.
4. The system fills the template, leaving only the class teacher and head teacher comments blank.
5. The bursar prints, or parents receive a PDF + SMS notification.

For schools coming off 8-4-4 templates, the migration is two weeks: one to map the school's existing marks book to the strand schema, one to train teachers on the new entry flow. See Owldid Systems →

Frequently asked questions