Achievement
Carlos Otieno courtesy of ANPPCAN
This week we received the welcome news that five of our Kenyan Schoolhouse students took their final national exams to determine whether they would qualify to enter University. They nailed it! with mean grade point averages among the highest in the country!
Here are their grades:
Carlos Otieno B+
Ian Ijera B+
Erastus Amway B
Nicholas Sonkoi B-
Susan Atieno C
Our top four students earned placements and scholarships to attend prestigious National Universities. The fifth KSH student has earned placement in a diploma program, not unlike our community college system.
Their lives now resemble our own children's preparation for freshman year. There are courses to choose, schedules to navigate, housing and roommates to worry over. Our partner organization ANPPCAN is working with each graduate individually and we have expressed our admiration for their hard work by sending each student a $500 grant.
Previous KSH graduates have gone on to earn degrees in Business, Architecture, Civil Engineering and have entered nursing, law and dentistry. Often, they return home to their villages in every corner of the country to work and help solve problems.
It's hard for me to do justice to the obstacles these students have confronted and overcome in their lives to arrive at this moment. All of our Kenyan Schoolhouse students come from poor families. Many have been orphaned, some have lived on the streets, all have suffered economic exploitation; child labor, sexual abuse, forced labor. For young women in rural parts of Kenya less than 20% ever graduate high school and early marriage is common and brings an end to any hope of going to school.
Carlos Otieno with grandmother and cousins courtesy of ANPPCAN
About a month ago, we told you about Carlos Otieno who entered our program orphaned (his parents died of HIV/AIDS). Carlos lived with his grandmother and cousins (also orphans), in a mud house that was washed away this spring by seasonal flooding. KSH provided emergency support to rebuild the house and Carlos managed somehow to continue in school and be among the top students in the country.
New house courtesy of ANPPCAN
Imagine yourself living in one room with four other people without running water, a toilet, or a light to study by. Imagine battling hunger, being the oldest and feeling responsible for the household, wanting and needing to help your grandmother, the man in the family at 17.
This explains why Carlos deserves our applause and why Kenyan Schoolhouse exists.
Studying at home courtesy of ANPPCAN
Once we enroll a student, we support them for the whole of their education. But it is the remarkable resilience and persistence of these young people that makes them role models for brothers, friends, schoolmates. If you don't have a lantern or candle, then study when the sun rises before the day's work begins, while others sleep.
It's wonderful to see any young person achieve their dreams. Carlos, Ian, Erastus, Nicholas and Susan share dreams that their schooling will not just change their life but also help their families and their communities.
Today, we ask you to help the many children in Kenya we can support and help if we have the money to do so.
Click here to make an online donation, or send us a check made out to Media Voices for Children. We'll send 100% of your donations to Kenya where they will support the poorest children and we'll stay with them until they reach their dream.
Every child deserves the chance to go to school. Nothing protects a child from exploitation better than a day at school. Help us make that happen for the many who are waiting their turn.