Nairobi, April 27 -- In Kisii Central, male high school principals are grappling with challenges that make their work unusually difficult.

When they took part in a study on the influence of gender on job satisfaction among secondary school teachers in Kenya, published in the International Journal of Advanced and Multidisciplinary Social Science in 2017, they spoke candidly. One principal described the pressure of dealing with widows who sought to pay school fees "in kind".

"In our society today, we have more widows than widowers. When they come to the office, they expect favours by virtue of being female and widows, saying, 'I am single; where do you expect me to get money?'"

Read: Why teachers must pay attention to mental he...