Healthy Minds, Healthy Lives-600 Girls in Kenya

Girls at Risk

As you may recall, Village Impact was approached by leaders from the community of Mai Mahiu in Nakuru County, Kenya. Over 2,700 children attend the single primary school in the village—but the closest high school was miles away down dangerous highway corridors. 
 
While the leaders expressed concern for the safety and future of all their students, they were particularly worried about the girls in their community. 
 
Even before the COVID crisis, girls were at an increased risk of not finishing their primary and secondary education. Some are needed to take care of younger siblings when their parents have to go to work or are burdened with other time-consuming household tasks like water collection. Others are preyed upon by Boda Boda (motorcycle transport) or truck drivers for sexual favours in exchange for local transport or a few shillings to buy food or essentials like menstrual supplies, otherwise out of reach for their families to provide. More social challenges exist in the community, like a prevalence of child-headed households, low literacy rates and lack of parental guidance. 
 
Many girls here are exposed to generational cycles of abuse, neglect, and exploitation and are exposed to drugs and alcohol at a very tender age. Early marriage, pregnancy, and gang recruitment are not uncommon, all of which drive adolescent girls to drop out of school.
 
On top of that, during school closures because of COVID, some children were forced to work outside the home—selling firewood, engaging in farm and domestic work and, in some cases, survival sex work. It has been hard for struggling families to sacrifice small income gains and send their children back to school, especially girls. 
 
With Your Help, There Is Good News

But there is good news. With your help, Village Impact is committed to a long-term relationship with the community, starting with the construction and resourcing of the 600-seat all-girls public school and broader community work to elevate the value of education as a path out of poverty. 
 
Phase 1 construction of 12 classrooms, two science labs, a school library and water/sanitation facilities is nearing completion. Doors opened in May, and we welcomed an inaugural class of 110 girls to Grades 9 & 10! 
 
School Counselling
 
We are thrilled to share that we've also hired a dedicated Pyscho-Social Counselor for the school. Please welcome Connie Kamonya to the team! Connie is passionate about empowering teens and has worked with students on mentorship and behavioural change programs in various schools. 
 
Her role is to promote all learners' emotional, social and academic growth and, working with teachers and administrators, helps ensure everyone learns in a safe, healthy, and supportive environment.
 
We are pleased to report that Connie has been settling in well, getting to know both the girls at the school and their parents. She has been able to orient the school staff, girls and their families to her role and what value she can deliver, both on academic and personal levels. And she has begun to provide one-on-one counselling and group sessions to students, parents and staff in two core areas of focus: 
 
Educational and Vocational Counselling:  Creating awareness amongst students on the importance of education, educational opportunities available to them, and career prospects is a crucial responsibility for Connie. During counselling interactions, she helps students answer essential questions about how, what, where, when and why to study. Students may also need help to get acquainted with the learning process, understand how to use school time effectively, self-study, peer study habits, and how to deal with excessive anxieties at examination time and fear of failure. She is also addressing challenges in deciding on a career path helping students to recognize and match their attributes and talents with future employment opportunities. This allows the students to start seeing education as an essential step toward their future and develop a love for it.
 
Personal Social Counselling: Connie helps students, parents, and teachers process challenges affecting and disrupting their lives, including anxiety, depression, communication issues, abuse, grief, and relationship difficulties. She is working to advocate for and equip and empower girls with the life skills necessary to live and adapt peacefully and positively in any community. She's also helping teachers, parents and caregivers with skills and knowledge to better relate to their kids and reinforcing essential values such as self-discipline, honesty, self-control, and dignity at home. Parental counselling is paramount as it allows a parent/ guardian to know whether a child benefits from counselling services offered at school.

Construction Progress

The second block of classrooms, which includes a science lab and library, has been completed, and a multi-room administration building is currently being constructed. The admin building will house the Principal's office, teachers' lounge and a large, highly-adaptable modular workspace that enables multifunctional use and flexibility for teacher's offices. 
 
Challenges

A challenge we are currently working to overcome is that the planned water solution, a borehole and solar pumping system, has been rendered inoperable due to the extreme heat of the groundwater–—on average, 68 degrees Celsius! We are consulting with VICDA and Well Aware, two local implementing partners, to explore how we may best meet the school's needs for the long term. 

All Because of You

Thanks again for your generous support of this project and the girls at Negya. We hope this report reminds you that you are making a difference in the lives of girls in Kenya every day. Without this school, their futures were very tenuous and uncertain. With this school, girls now have enhanced opportunities to dream big and have the education, skill and support to pursue them. 

We can't wait to share more in the next report! 

On July 24, 2022, Jessica will compete in the IRONMAN at Lake Placid, and we thought there was no better time to give you an update on the project to which Jessica has dedicated her competition! Every dollar you've helped Jessica raise is being rushed to Kenya to move the project forward. 

As you'll recall, with your support, Village Impact is tackling our most ambitious project yet—constructing and resourcing a 600-seat, all-girls high school in Mai Mahiu, Kenya. We're incredibly grateful for you and Jessica, and are thrilled to share this brief progress report! 

• Construction of the two-story school is well underway. Our local construction team completed the first block of 6 classrooms in April, and we opened the doors and welcome students for the first term of the Kenya school year, which began in May. We welcomed one hundred Form 1 students (Grade 9) and 10 Form 2 students as the inaugural cohort. The school administration had decided only to allow Form 1 (Grade 9) registration as part of the phase-in plan for the school. Still, parents came daily asking for space for a Form 2 (Grade 10) class, so the Acting Principal opened up spots to accommodate these eager students. Since the school is not yet eligible to be registered with the Government, which will provide the teaching staff and ongoing operating budget, part of the girls' school fees have gone to hire three community teachers to cover teaching duties in the interim. The governmental registration will be processed as soon as the final construction is completed.

• A dedicated Psycho-Social Counsellor was hired for the school and is currently in an on-boarding process. We're thrilled to welcome Connie Kamonya to the Village Impact team. Connie is passionate about teens and has worked with students on mentorship and behavioural change programs in various schools. Connie was introduced to the girls and will assume full-time duties at the school in July. Your funding will help construct Connie's office and counselling space-more on that to come in future reports!

• A borehole well was successfully drilled, and we installed a three-tank storage system to provide a clean, safe water source for the girl's school, the primary school's population of 3,200 students, and the surrounding community. The current challenge is that the water coming from the well ranges in temperature from 62-80° Celsius. Because of this heat, the first water pump installation failed and finding a pumping system that can accommodate both the extreme heat and pumping capacity has proven difficult. However, we reached out to Well Aware, a US-based water-focused NGO with projects also in the Rift Valley, and with their help, we are confident we will have a solution in hand shortly.  

Check out our VIDEO UPDATE on the project here!

Thank you again so much! None of this would be possible without your generous support. Make sure to cheer Jessica on in her race! Track her progress through the IRONMAN app here!

We look forward to the next update and hope you do too!