Education for children with disabilities, Kenya

We are excited to share the progress and achievements of our project, which is transforming the lives of students with learning disabilities in Kenya.

November 2024 marked a significant milestone in our efforts to address the issue of older students with learning disabilities remaining in special schools across Kenya, often with no plans for their transition to adult life beyond school.

Our second cohort of 20 special education teachers successfully completed their final training module, and together with the first group of 17, this brings the total number of fully trained teachers to 37. The teachers have been highly engaged and appreciative of the training, highlighting its relevance and importance in addressing a long-neglected area of special education. During the training, teachers shared striking examples of the challenges they face, including students well beyond school-leaving age remaining in the system due to a lack of transition support. One teacher described having a 40-year-old student still attending their school.

Thanks to the project, 37 schools now have trained teachers actively applying their knowledge. Under their guidance, 29 students have so far transitioned from school to adulthood through well-structured, individualised plans. This progress has provided 29 families with a sense of hope and confidence about their children’s futures. These school-leavers are now engaged in meaningful work, contributing to their families, and challenging societal misconceptions about individuals with learning disabilities.

One such school leaver is Abio, a 22-year-old orphan with moderate learning disabilities who attended Hola Special School in the remote northeast of Kenya. She lives with her aunt on a small rural farm in an arid region. With support from her teacher, Madam Dishani, who used her training to help Abio transition from school to adulthood, they identified an opportunity to expand the vegetable farming already happening at home. After visiting Abio's home and involving her aunt in the project, together they decided that an irrigation system was needed to enable year-round cultivation and improve yields. A small grant from the project funded the purchase of a water pump (pictured), which now supplies water from a nearby river. This is now transforming the farm from a marginal operation into a sustainable income source. Abio, who had grown disengaged at school, is now fully involved in her own enterprise, gaining self-esteem, dignity, and a reliable source of income.

The success of school-leavers like Abio has inspired many teachers to establish permanent transition programmes in their schools. Our monitoring shows that trained teachers have significantly expanded the programme’s impact by sharing their knowledge with an average of five additional colleagues each. Moreover, with these demonstrated successes, schools are beginning to unlock new sources of funding from families, school boards, local NGOs, church groups, and private sector supporters, such as Mombasa Cement. This means your support has not only initiated new school initiatives but has also enabled them to become increasingly self-sustaining and independent.

Another recent milestone in this project is the progress we’ve made towards embedding the training into Kenya’s national special needs education curriculum. In November 2024, the Director of the Kenya Institute of Special Education (KISE) and senior management, including the Deputy Director of Programmes, formally committed to integrating the training into KISE’s future course offerings. We look forward to this training becoming a standalone certificate course as well as part of both the Functional Assessment Diploma and the Inclusive Education Course. With KISE gaining greater autonomy from the central government, the process of introducing the new course and modules is expected to be faster and more streamlined.

We are delighted by achievements in both training and practical application over the past four months made possible by your generous support. Thank you so much for helping us create meaningful and lasting change in the lives of children with disabilities.