The Complete Somesha School ERP & LMS Guide: Everything You Need to Upload, Onboard, and Transform Your School

1. System Overview: Why Somesha is 100% Free

Managing a modern school in Kenya under the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC) requires tracking intricate formative rubrics, learning competencies, continuous assessments, attendance, and fee ledgers. Traditional school software packages charge exorbitant per-student licensing fees (ranging from KES 200,000 to KES 800,000 annually), locking out hundreds of deserving public and private institutions.

Somesha was engineered to eliminate this barrier completely. All core modules—including unlimited student admissions, class rosters, marks gradebooks, automated report card generation, and fee ledgers—are provided 100% free of charge forever. There are no monthly subscriptions, no software license fees, and no per-student penalties. Schools only pay nominal carrier rates for optional bulk SMS alerts (at 0.8 KES per SMS) if they choose to send SMS notifications through Safaricom or Airtel.

2. Complete 25+ App Features Breakdown

Every module inside Somesha has been built from the ground up to reflect how Kenyan primary schools, Junior Secondary Schools (JSS), and Senior High Schools operate day-to-day:

3. Step 1: Initial School Registration & Profile Setup

Getting started takes less than 5 minutes. As the school administrator or principal, follow these simple setup steps:

1. Register Your Institution: Navigate to /register and provide your official School Name, institutional email, phone number, and a secure password.
2. Upload School Crest & Logo: Head to Dashboard > Settings > School Profile. Upload your school's crest/logo in high resolution (PNG or JPEG, transparent background recommended). This logo will automatically appear on all report cards, fee receipts, student IDs, and invoices.
3. Add Official Contact Details: Specify your P.O. Box address, physical campus location, official phone numbers, and official school motto (e.g., "Excellence Through Discipline").
4. Upload Principal Signature Stamp: Upload a clean PNG image of the principal or headteacher's signature and school rubber stamp. Somesha will automatically stamp official PDF report cards during generation, saving hours of manual signing.

4. Step 2: Academic Terms & Grading Configuration

Before entering student marks, configure your academic calendar and evaluation criteria:

• Set Academic Year & Terms: Create the active Academic Year (e.g., 2026) and specify start and end dates for Term 1, Term 2, and Term 3. Completed terms can be locked to prevent unauthorized grade modifications.
• Select Curriculum & Grading Standard:
  • CBC Standard (Primary & Junior Secondary): Uses the official KICD 4-tier rubric:
    • EE (Exceeding Expectations): 80% – 100%
    • ME (Meeting Expectations): 60% – 79%
    • AE (Approaching Expectations): 40% – 59%
    • BE (Below Expectations): 0% – 39%
  • 8-4-4 Standard (Senior Secondary): 12-point grading scale (A, A-, B+, B, B-, C+, C, C-, D+, D, D-, E) with customizable score boundaries.
• Configure Exam Weightings: For instance, set Opener Exam to 30% and End-Term Exam to 70%, or maintain 100% summative weightings. Somesha auto-aggregates these based on your configuration.

5. Step 3: Classes, Streams & Subject Allocations

Structure your school's physical classroom organization:

1. Create Grade Levels: Add your classes—such as Grade 1, Grade 2... Grade 7, Grade 8, Grade 9 (JSS), Form 1, Form 2, Form 3, Form 4.
2. Add Streams: Under each grade, define your streams (e.g., Grade 7 North, Grade 7 South, Grade 8 Blue, Grade 8 Green).
3. Map Subjects & Teacher Allocations: Link each teacher to their assigned subject and stream (e.g., Teacher Kamau → Mathematics → Grade 8 Blue). When Teacher Kamau logs into their portal, they will only see Grade 8 Blue Mathematics in their marks gradebook.

6. Step 4: What You Need to Upload (Excel & CSV Bulk Import Specs)

You do not need to enter hundreds of students one-by-one. Somesha allows you to import your entire school roster in seconds using standard Excel or CSV spreadsheets.

7. Step 5: Daily Attendance & Timetables

Teachers can take morning or afternoon roll call directly from their smartphones or laptops in under 30 seconds:

• 1-Click Mark All Present: By default, all students in the selected stream appear as present. The teacher simply taps the name of any student who is absent or late.
• Automated SMS Absence Alerts: If configured, the system can automatically send an instant SMS alert to the parent: "Dear Parent, Brian Kiprono was marked absent from Grade 7 East today at 8:15 AM. Please contact the school if this is an error."
• Weekly Timetable Conflict Resolver: Build timetables without accidental double-booking. The system detects if Teacher Kamau is assigned to two different classrooms during period 3.

8. Step 6: Gradebook Scoring & 1-Click Automated Report Cards

Exam scoring and report card generation are the crowning features of Somesha. What used to take two weeks of late-night manual paperwork for entire teaching staffs now takes minutes:

1. Teachers Open Gradebook:Select the Class, Stream, and Subject (e.g., Grade 7 East → Integrated Science).
2. Fast Numerical Entry: Teachers enter scores (0–100) or tap competency indicators (EE, ME, AE, BE). The system automatically highlights validation errors (such as scores above 100).
3. Real-time Class Ranking & Descriptors: Mean scores, stream rankings, and performance trends calculate dynamically without clicking save or refresh.
4. 1-Click Report Card Generation: Click "Generate All Report Cards" to produce high-resolution, print-ready PDF reports for the entire class.
5. Official Merged PDF Download: Download all student report cards merged into a single PDF document, ready for double-sided high-speed printing on closing day.

9. Step 7: Fee Billing, Invoicing & M-Pesa Auto-Reconciliation

Tired of lost bank deposit slips, delayed reconciliations, and long lines at the bursar's office? Somesha provides end-to-end fee automation:

• Set Fee Structures: Define breakdown line items per grade (e.g., Tuition: KES 12,000; Boarding: KES 18,000; Activity: KES 1,500; Exam fee: KES 1,000).
• Bulk Invoicing: Automatically generate invoices for all enrolled students at the start of the term with prior balances carried forward.
• Safaricom Daraja STK Push: The bursar clicks "Prompt Parent Phone" on any outstanding invoice. The parent instantly receives an M-Pesa prompt on their phone screen: "Pay KES 5,000 to School? Enter PIN".
• Zero-Touch Ledger Reconciliation: The moment the parent enters their PIN, Safaricom's webhook clears the ledger balance, issues an official receipt number, and triggers an SMS confirmation to the parent.
• Financial Auditing & Cash Book: Real-time charts showing Expected Fees, Total Collected, Outstanding Debtors, and bank deposit reconciliations.

10. Step 8: Virtual STEM Science Laboratories (50 Experiments)

Bring practical science to every learner without costly physical apparatus or hazardous chemicals. Somesha includes an embedded generic STEM Virtual Simulation Engine:

11. Step 9: Kahoot-Style Live Multiplayer Quizzes & Gamification

Transform classroom reviews into thrilling live competitions. Teachers can launch real-time interactive quiz sessions that engage students like never before:

• Join in 5 Seconds via Game PIN: Students navigate to /play on any phone, tablet, or school computer and enter the 6-digit PIN. No app installation required!
• Color-Coded Interactive Response Buttons: Students answer questions on their screens using vibrant geometric buttons (Red Triangle ▲, Blue Diamond ◆, Yellow Circle ●, Green Square ■).
• Authoritative Server Timers & Streak Bonuses: Fast answers earn higher points; consecutive correct answers trigger streak multipliers with fire animations 🔥.
• Classroom Podium Leaderboard: Live animated podium displays top learners after each question, celebrating academic achievement and building healthy motivation.
• Direct LMS & Gradebook Sync: Completed game scores can be saved directly to the student's Gradebook record with a single click.

12. Frequently Asked Questions by School Heads