Christopher Khaemba

Christopher Situma Khaemba is a Kenyan educator, former headmaster of Alliance High School, and the current Dean of the African Leadership Academy in South Africa. He moved from Alliance to become the founding Dean at the South Africa-based academy in 2008. Widely regarded as one of Africa's leading educationists, Khaemba was named the head administrator of the new institution at its inception in September 2008. He had served as Principal of Alliance for 10 years, during which period he oversaw the re-establishment of the school's strong performance in academics and involvement in extra-curricula activities.

Khaemba attended Kenyatta University, Nairobi where he graduated with an MBA. He was an officer and pilot with the Kenya Air Force before quitting in 1984. Khaemba moved on into teaching, and he has never turned back.

After making the drastic turn from the military into academia, Khaemba joined the teaching staff at Alliance High School, where he would go on to become a Mathematics and Physics teacher for the next fourteen years. During that time, he rose through the ranks becoming Housemaster, Careers Master, Senior Master, and Deputy Principal. Most of these positions would see him take charge of daily operations at the school routine and implementation of the curriculum. Khaemba's no-nonsense approach to learning earned him the nickname "Sodium" from his students. He was appointed by the government as headmaster of Friends School Kamusinga in 1995 to overhaul the declining standards in the school. Within three years, Khaemba had instituted changes that helped the school regain its prominence as an academic giant and power-house of co-curricula activities in Western Province and nationally. Because of his success and a leadership philosophy that stressed the importance of imparting students a well-rounded education, Khaemba was recalled to become Principal at Alliance in 1998.

Khaemba is widely reputed for reinstating the position of Alliance as a top secondary education institution in Kenya; under his Principal-ship, the school was consistently ranked within the top-ten best performing schools in the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education. He has stated that discipline is a key component that he acquired while in military service, and is critical to both his and his students' success. Khaemba is also well known for placing students from varied backgrounds into universities in the United States, especially Ivy League colleges. while responding to interview with Nation media, this is what Christopher Khaemba had to say, "Apart from getting the school back to Academic supremacy, for five years Alliance High School continuously won most of the Awards at the National drama festival. I placed on average 20 to 30 students into Ivy League universities with full funding. We fully replaced all the old students' dormitories with modern ones in a space of 7 years. No student left school on account of inability to pay fees" Alliance through his determination moved places.

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