Supporting women education in Kenya, Africa.
Dear Sponsors and Friends,
I have been working at our high school in Kenya since September and enjoying every day teaching. We have 100 girls in classes 9 through 12. Another 15 girls were rescued from the Masai Mara from forced early marriage and circumcision by bringing them to our high school. This brings our total of rescued girls in the past three years to 45. Ten girls are working at our nursery school as teachers during their gap year and before they enroll in college. Thirty five young women are attending college through your generous support.
If you have friends that would like to sponsor a girl, please let me know as we need many more sponsors.
The Mara parents are very poor and the girls arrive at school with nothing. Above the girls receive their boarding supplies and uniforms from our generous sponsors.
Grace has just graduated from our BEADS High School and is now interning as a teacher at our nursery school. After successfully completing her internship, she will enroll in the university to study agronomy. She wants to help the poor grow their own food so that no child will go to bed hungry as she did so many times. Grace was born in the Kibera slums – the largest slum in Africa. “My mother struggled and fought to feed and educate me and my 3 sisters and 2 brothers. I never thought I would be able to attend high school due to school fees. I expected to be married off to a much older man who I had never met or to become a housemaid in a rich man’s house. In 8th grade, I almost lost all hope. I thought it was a miracle when I was sponsored to join the BEADS High School. I knew my life would change completely. The stars never shone like this before. Education is the key the key to success,” Grace wrote in her journal.
Grace studying agronomy
Every year we celebrate all the tribes that attend our school. This year we have 6 tribes of the 42 in Kenya - Maasai, Kamba, Luo, Kisii, Digo and Kikuyu. Each tribe builds their traditional hut and greets the other tribes with a welcoming song, an explanation of their hut, how their people live and earn money, a traditional song and closing with their prayer. We do this to counter tribalism which has been rampant in Kenya in many of the past elections. We continue with a class unit which focuses on genocide in other countries e.g. Rwanda, Kenya, and Germany. This year the unit culminated with a guest speaker who escaped the Hutu and Tutsi genocide in Rwanda.
In academics we continue to improve our scores on the national tests. Speaking only English at school and having bookclubs weekly are the greatest influence for our academic performance.
(from left) Elizabeth, Debby, Crystal and Grace
Thank you from all the sponsored girls, their families and communities.