SEAM (Self Education And Mentorship) Program

1. Overview

During the last quarter, the COHESU SEAM Program experienced strengthening of its programs including education, sports, and entrepreneurial skills development. The period was marked by the expansion of the Outpost Program to 14 homes, increased participation in roller skating activities, strengthened environmental learning through floriculture, and the successful introduction of a SEAM BIZ Club focused on practical entrepreneurship skills. These developments reflect COHESU’s continued commitment to holistic, community-rooted learning beyond the classroom. COHESU participated in the GlobalGiving “Passport to Purpose” fundraising campaign which provided a great opportunity to learn and build our capacity.

2. SEAM Outpost Program

The SEAM Outpost Program continued to expand, enabling COHESU to reach more children and youth within underserved communities. The Outpost program improved access to learning opportunities closer to where participants live, improving inter-generational learning and reducing barriers related to distance and cost. By incorporating parent participation, the outposts provided safe spaces for mentorship, life skills development, and experiential learning, reinforcing COHESU’s model of community-based education. Parents participated in the annual deliberative dialogues to enhance relevant teaching and experiences for their children. This committed participation demonstrated strong community acceptance and growing demand for the program.

3. Skating Program Development

Skating emerged as one of the most popular and highly anticipated activities within the SEAM Program this quarter. Participation increased steadily, with children consistently expressing excitement and enthusiasm for each session. For many participants, skating is always a highlight of their week, fostering a strong sense of joy, motivation, and belonging. We are grateful for the donations of skateboards and shoes from our supporters.

Beyond enjoyment, we appreciate that the skating program continues to support important developmental outcomes, including physical fitness, balance, coordination, discipline, and confidence. Children demonstrated noticeable progress in skill level and resilience. Skating has proven to be a powerful engagement tool, strengthening attendance and retention across other SEAM learning activities.

In response to the growing popularity of the program, COHESU hopes that we can raise funds to create a larger, safer skating space for the children. Expanding the skating area will allow more participants to skate comfortably at the same time, reduce the risk of injury, and provide an environment that supports structured training as well as free practice. This planned improvement reflects COHESU’s commitment to listening to children’s needs and investing in safe, supportive spaces that nurture both enjoyment and growth.

4. Floriculture Club

The floriculture club is an expanding club, where children actively participate in planting, watering, and maintaining flowers, gaining hands-on knowledge in environmental stewardship, agribusiness basics, and teamwork. A key milestone this quarter was the construction of a new shed-net for the Floriculture Club. The shed-net has significantly enhanced the learning environment by providing a controlled space for nurturing seedlings and practicing sustainable floriculture techniques. The shed-net has also improved plant survival rates and positioned the club for future income-generating activities linked to flower sales.

5. SEAM BIZ Club

This quarter marked the successful launch of the SEAM BIZ Club, designed to introduce children to entrepreneurship and financial literacy through practical, hands-on learning. As a first enterprise activity, club members learned how to make all-purpose liquid soap. The children were involved in the entire process, including measuring ingredients, mixing, quality control, packaging, branding, basic pricing concepts and sales.

Through this activity, participants gained skills in teamwork and innovation, while also understanding the importance of hygiene products within their communities. The soap produced is intended for sale, providing children with real-world experience in small-scale business operations and reinforcing the link between skills development and economic empowerment. This club will also create an avenue for the sales of other products like Arts and Crafts, which they have previously learned how to produce.

6. SEAM Lunch and the Lunch Buddy Program

COHESU has a program that provides lunch every Saturday for SEAM participants. During this last quarter, COHESU successfully hosted the SEAM LUNCH initiative, through which a total of 600 nutritious meals were served to children across the program. This achievement was made possible through the generous support of our partners and individual supporters participating in the Lunch Buddy Program. Through this initiative, program supporters commit to supporting children’s lunches, ensuring that participants have access to regular, healthy meals during program days.

The SEAM LUNCH not only addressed immediate nutritional needs but also enhanced children’s ability to focus, participate actively, and fully benefit from learning and sports activities. The Lunch Buddy Program fosters a strong sense of shared responsibility and reminds us of the interconnectivity between community solidarity, learning, well-being, and dignity.

7. End-Year Open Day and Community Celebration

To conclude the year, COHESU SEAM hosted an End-Year Open Day that brought together children, parents, guardians, and community members. The event provided a platform for participants to showcase what they had learned across the year and to openly share their experiences within the SEAM programs. Children entertained their guests and confidently spoke about their growth in skills, discipline, teamwork, and self-belief, while parents reflected on positive changes they observed in their children, including improved responsibility, confidence, and motivation toward learning.

The Open Day also served as a celebration of excellence and commitment. Exceptional program participants were recognized and rewarded with trophies in appreciation of their consistency, leadership, teamwork, and outstanding performance across skating, floriculture, SEAM BIZ, and outpost activities. This recognition motivated participants, reinforced a culture of effort and achievement, and strengthened the sense of belonging among families and the wider COHESU community.

8. Outcomes and Impact

• Increased program reach through the expansion of SEAM Outposts
• Improved physical and social skills among children participating in skating
• Enhanced environmental and agricultural learning through the new floriculture shed-net
• Strengthened entrepreneurship and financial literacy skills via the SEAM BIZ Club

9. Way Forward

In this last quarter of the year, COHESU’s SEAM mission of youth development through a holistic approach of integrating sports, environmental learning, and entrepreneurship continued to be strengthened to create engaging pathways for children to learn beyond the classroom. In the coming quarter, COHESU aims to further strengthen these initiatives by scaling successful activities, deepening community involvement, and exploring additional income-generating opportunities that support program sustainability.

Climate, Environment and Climate Science

     COHESU-SEAM program intends to improve the nutritional status of families through training of adolescents and their parents on skills for local production of vegetables, legumes and fruits for improved diets. The project aims to provide potential income-generating skills to adolescents, which will enable them to make self-sustaining choices that they don’t normally receive from regular school curricula. SEAM program therefore teaches the children Arts and Crafts, smart agriculture & tree nursery start-ups, computer skills, business skills, and financial management skills from an early age through education and mentorships for hands on skills. COHESU-SEAM Climate Change Workshop was an initiative aimed at providing a blueprint to the nexus between SEAM programs and Climate Action. It was intended to offer background understanding on concept such as climate, weather, environment, seasons & seasons change as well as climate change and to link SEAM activities to Climate Action, to boost the momentum to realize The Paris Agreement on climate change through children and youth participations.

 The workshop program was designed in the way to achieve both the objectives and outputs with each session having its own learning objectives and concrete outputs. The outcomes of the training workshop were;

-          Initiated a well informed and climate change aware SEAM youths and children who can lead and engage in climate change action to improve environment conservation among themselves and their peers guided by mentors.

 -          Tentative plan for next steps that include tree planting to increase green cover for climate action, participate in plastic pollution control through recycling and reusing in tree nurseries and in gardening, and controlled waste disposal, sustainable agricultural practices for improved household nutrition.

By Jared Omondi

 Self-sustainable farming outpost program

     We have been training our SEAM children on self-sustainability, currently focusing on farming skills and having trained several children and distributed seeds to 20 families, on top of the 7 outpost home we had initially been training.

Seeds being distributed include: Spring onions, Managu (Black nightshade), Skumawiki (Collard greens), tomato, Brinjals (Eggplant), Dania (Coriander), Spinach, Cowpeas, Beans and Capsicums

SEAM skateboarders

     We are also working with the Skateboarding Society of Kenya to bring skateboarding to the children -both boys and girls- of the community. Our hope is that this activity will help bring the community children a space where they can participate in a unique outdoor sporting activity, by hopefully campaigning to gather the resources needed to build a miniature skate park on the SEAM grounds, which will be open to all the children within the community and outside the community. We hope that this will also give the boys of the community more of a reason to engage with SEAM and improve male enrollment and retention into the program.