Water & Sanitation ensure 2000 Kenyan girls learn

We HWF with beneficiaries from the primary schools in Kenya (Nyanza Province Girls) thank you for your continuing support that has ensured that a majority percentage of girls are being enrolled in schools thanks to the support gained from GLOBAL GIVING.

During the past 5 months HWF has embarked on activities aimed at ensuring that the girl child is kept at school.One of the major steps taken to ensure the continuity of girls in school was the distribution of Sanitary towels in 2 schools in Manga District, Nyanza Province in Kenya.The lack of proper sanitation for the girls pupils in primary schools acts as a reason for lower enrolment of girls students in schools with some of them absconding classes due to lack of sanitary towels.

The sanitary towels was distributed to 3 Primary schools to children aged 13 onwards and these were of standard 7 and 8 ( Kenya Curricular of classes in Primary education) .The schools that benefited from these towels were as follows:-

1. Rianyabwanga Primary school - 168 girls benefited 2. Kiangoso Primary School - 72 girls benefited 3.Bitundugusu Primary School - 80 girls benefited

Due to the large number of girls in school in the regions, it was not possible to supply the sanitary towels to 9 other schools in the region that had students who lack the basic sanitary needs.HWF assured their school heads that through donor community and GLOBAL GIVING initiative , more students in the remaining 9 schools will be provided with sanitary towels and training facilities to ensure that more than 2000 Kenyan girls learn comfortably and competitively.

With the continuing support from Globalgiving and wellwishers,HWF plans to provide sanitary needs to female students who have reached menses in 12 Primary schools in Manga District, Nyanza District,Kenya.This will inturn keep the girl child in school and further their learning environment.

What do you think on this progress of keeping Kenyan girls in school?

Our appointment with Health & Water Foundation was for 09:30hrs with the program officer, Mr. Munuve. We were warmly ushered into the office not so far from the Nairobi central business district - a well organized office with a sizable team welcomed us and got straight to business about the project.

The project was started in 2003 and its main mandate was to provide water and sanitation in Nyanza province, but later diversified to HIV/AIDS training and facilitation. They supply the rural communities with clean and safe water, build piped water harvesting equipment, latrines and dig boreholes.

According to Mr. Munuve, their method and approach in the region is very effective because of good weather and good reception from the communities, who provide support in terms of labor, food and materials. but their biggest challenge is mostly funds since they have not been able to dig any boreholes. Amongst their projects they initiated a program in the community schools called the "hand wash" to facilitate hygiene on latrines by building toilet blocks, and supplying soap and hand washing facilities.

They also provide sanitary and sanitation training to school and community girls which has stemmed up absenteeism in schools, improved performance, reduced water borne diseases and improved hygiene.

About Mr. Munuve

He is a program officer with Health and Water Foundation who joined in 2006 and since has learnt a lot in donor relations, project planning, and implementation. He is mostly driven by the fact that the organization gives back to the community and enables him interact with different people and cultures. "Our work has directly improved on individual school performance and absenteeism by reducing the number of children in these communities involved in providing water and sanitation," he said.

In addition to visiting the staff, GlobalGiving evaluations usually involve interviews with the people in the community served. However, in this case, we could not give a conclusive take on this as we were not able to talk directly to any of the beneficiaries. Furthermore, the accounts were not made available to us.

We like to know whether the community knows about the project and whether they support it.

According to Munuve, the project is supported by the community. When projects and construction is going on, the members of the community provide free labour. Stones and building bricks are also contributed. The community also offers to cook and provide lunch during when construction works are going on.

You can read a detailed report (attached below).

• Healthandwaterfoundationevalpart172909.pdf (PDF)
  
• Healthandwaterfoundationevalpart272909.pdf (PDF)