Return vulnerable children from Kibera to School

The School Transition Programme reopened its doors on the 4th January to welcome children after a 9-month break.

We are picking up where we left off with 35 children in our school preparation and transition classes.

The government had opted for a phased reopening of schools. So five children successfully moved from the transition programme into the Fountains of Hope School in October last year.

The children are excited to be back with their friends and to have lots of activities to do each day after a long time of being at home with little to do.

We're following the government's guidelines to keep children COVID-safe. All children and staff wear masks and sit 1m apart in class, we've also added more handwashing stations to ensure all kids keep washing hands regularly.

Thank you to everyone who has supported us over the past year to provide food vouchers and home learning resources to children while they were out of school. We are so grateful for your partnership.

While the schools were closed, we were able to rebuild some of our classrooms after one of the walls crumbled. We're delighted with the extra space and bright environment that's been created. 

It's a new term, but schools in Kenya remain closed. Normally, we would be gathering for our start of term planning meetings and catching up with all our students, hearing all they got up to in the holidays. But sadly, we will have to wait until January when we hope the schools will reopen again.

In the meantime, we remain busy. Our teachers are supporting children's learning at home by sending worksheets home regularly for children to work on and return. Our partners, Vitabu Vyetu and Dignitas, are helping us with learning resources. The government have said that all children will have to repeat the year when schools reopen in January. As a result, some children are losing interest in their studies.

We are keen to keep the children engaged in positive activities so we have joined in the My Home My Playground Campaign run by Futbolmas Kenya. Our football coaches send out activity sheets to families each week full of games, craft activities and life skills lessons for the children to do at home with their family.

The social work team continue to check-in with each family's wellbeing and we have occasionally met up with small groups of children to check-in with how they are doing at home. Life is tough for many of our students at this time. All are missing their school friends, some are facing difficult situations at home, our staff are doing their best to ensure each child knows that we are still here for them.

Finally, with your help, we have been able to provide food vouchers to families every week throughout the school closures. So many parents have lost their jobs, these vouchers make sure our students don’t go hungry and relieve just a bit of the stress that parents are facing at this time.

Thank you so much for standing with us throughout this time. In a couple of weeks, from the 14-18 September, GlobalGiving will be matching all small donations (less than $50) by 50%. If you want to help us continue supporting our students as they remain home until January 2020. Please do make a small donation during that week on GlobalGiving. We are so grateful for your support.