School Accessibility Analysis in Kenya

GIS analysis of primary- and secondary-school distribution, proximity zones, and county-level school counts in Kenya.

National facility totals can hide geographic differences in education-service distribution. This project maps school locations, creates straight-line proximity zones, and summarizes school counts by county to support initial education-access screening.

1. Reviewed school points and Kenya county boundaries.
2. Checked coordinate systems and projected the working layers to WGS 1984 UTM Zone 37S.
3. Classified records into primary and secondary schools.
4. Created 3 km buffers around primary schools and 5 km buffers around secondary schools.
5. Used a spatial join to count mapped schools within each county.
6. Applied thematic symbology and exported presentation-ready layouts.

School distribution	Primary-school 3 km proximity

Secondary-school 5 km proximity	Schools per county

• Primary schools are more numerous than secondary schools in the analyzed dataset.
• Mapped schools are unevenly distributed across Kenya.
• Western and central areas show higher concentrations of mapped schools.
• Some areas have fewer schools or less buffer coverage and may merit more detailed investigation.
• County school totals help compare supply, but population and school capacity are needed for a fuller access assessment.

• Attribute selection and feature classification
• Coordinate-system checking and projection
• Buffer analysis and spatial joins
• County-level aggregation
• Graduated-color symbology
• Map layout design and PNG/PDF export

• Four final maps in PNG and PDF formats
• Written project report

The public repository contains the final maps and report. Working source data, the file geodatabase, and the ArcMap project are not included.

• Buffers measure straight-line proximity, not road-network travel time or actual journeys.
• Buffer overlap does not prove that a school has sufficient places, staff, facilities, or acceptable quality.
• County totals are not adjusted for population or the number of school-age children.
• Results depend on the completeness, accuracy, and date of the source school records.
• The maps are appropriate for initial screening and portfolio demonstration, not official service-coverage decisions without updated data and field verification.

├── Output      Final PNG and PDF maps
├── Report      Project report in Word and PDF formats
└── README.md

Vivian Mbachi — GIS & Data Analyst, Nairobi, Kenya
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