Africa Education Initiative (AEI)
Hope of The Maasai
MODERATOR: One man, two women, and
three girls, with the help of USAID's Africa
Education Initiative, are attempting to
change a culture, a people, and possibly a
nation. Ledama Olekina, a Maasai from Narok,
Kenya, an activist for cultural awareness,
and founder of Maasai Education Discovery has
been on a mission.
MR. OLEKINA: I saw a need for
education and decided that it would be good
to focus on female education. Traditionally
and historically girls have not been favored;
a lot of them are married off when they're
still very young, and women don't really own
any property, it's just not fair…and our future
depends on women.
I met Dr. Sarah Moten, who -- when
I shared with her my passion to help
improve the community, she then shared
with me her program, so we teamed
up and we started working together.
USAID has been a tremendous boost,
because this year we have a total of 700
girls who -- we're working with funding
through USAID.
MS. KISAI: Ledama came to my high
school and he was recruiting Maasai girls
that had financial problems. The
headmistress happened to give out my name,
and I so I joined MED.
MS. KAELO: I joined Maasai
Education Discovery where I studied
computers for one year, and luckily I came
here.
MS. NKADORI: So Ledama came looking for us and that
was really something that I always
appreciate.
MR. OLEKINA: At MED we do a
variety of different things. Training for
young girls, these are really needy girls.
We train them in computer
training, and a 100 percent of our girls are
funded through our own ways and also through
USAID. These girls were among the first
girls funded through the Ambassador Girls
Scholarship program. I said to them, if you
guys do well, I will get you a scholarship to
go to America.
So I met Dr. Daniels, the president
of the Chicago State University, and
also spoke a lot with Dr. Sarah Moten.
I just found myself saying, what would
it mean if you had Maasai girls in your
school? You know, they would bring you
diversity, they would bring you change in
your school, this school would really
gain a lot from them, and in return
you'd be giving something back. Then
she said, sure.
MS. DANIEL: I said yes, and so as
a result of that interaction, I was willing
to sponsor three young women from Kenya.
MS. MOTEN: Dr. Daniel
said, listen what can we do to help, and she
is now paying for the full scholarship for
three Kenyan students who hope to become
doctors and go back to the Maasai area,
Narok, in Kenya.
MS. KISAI: I happened to be one
of the three girls who did really well in
their final exam, and I got a scholarship to
Chicago State.
MS. NKADORI: When the results came
out and I was among them, I was so happy. It
was, I guess, one of the most happiest things
that I've ever, you know, encountered,
because I knew that was a great opportunity for me to
fulfill my dreams.
MS. KAELO: I was quite excited. I
didn't believe it because I have never
thought about it, and then when it came to
coming over, it was kind of painful, leaving
my parents, leaving my friends, leaving, you
know, the whole community.
MR. OLEKINA: I had to get the
blessings of their community, because I
really want these girls to be able to
remember where they come from. So I visited
their homes, and I was very happy with the
decision that I had made, because they all
spoke about wanting to come back home, they
wanted to be doctors who can come back and
give back to the community.
MS. NKADORI: It's like everybody
owns me in the Maasai community. Every
parent is my parent, you know, so as I grew
up and going to school, there's always this
big community, you know, appreciating my
excellence, appreciating me being to school.
MS. KISAI: It was pretty hard
leaving my family behind, as much as it was
exciting, it was frightening too. I got some
really good culture shocks. You know, back
home we are a community, everybody is
together, but you get here, you're all by
yourself.
MS. DANIEL: Agnes recently lost
her father, and she had to make a decision as
to whether or not she would go back home and
get pulled back into that setting, because
she was the oldest child and so she made that
difficult decision, not to go back home but
to remain and continue her studies, and do
her mourning right here.
MS. KISAI: My family supported me
through everything. You know, the most
important thing that they ever did was
believing in me. You know, even when I
didn't believe in myself, they still pushed
me to be where I am right now, they still
believe in me and that's what keeps me going.
MS. KAELO'S FATHER: When he heard
I was going to America, he felt he was really
excited and he loved it. He really thanks
God and thanks Ledama, because Ledama opened
the way for me to go to America.
MS. KAELO: My mom has played a big
role to make sure that I am the person I am,
to make sure that I get the education I get,
to see to it that I'm successful.
MS. KAELO'S MOTHER: They did not
go to school and they feel really inferior
that their parents didn't take them to
school. So they just prayed to God that
he gives them the strength to take all their
kids to school.
MS. NKADORI: I've developed to be
a better person, because I've encountered so
much diversity. I meet different people and
I get to appreciate how they think and how
they look and perceive a lot of other stuff.
MR. OLEKINA: They are excellent
students. Academically they are 4.0s, you
know, and through the challenge, and them
coming back, and wanting to come back home,
it just really encourages me to continue
doing that.
MS. DANIEL: My greatest
expectation of course is that they will
return home and that they will continue their
education and become physicians, and we would
do everything that we can to promote that.
MS. KAELO: My dream is to become a
doctor in the Maasai land and to help the
people, to become a voice of the women in the Maasai
land, and in Kenya
as a whole, and in the world as a whole. I
see myself as this counselor for girls, I
see myself as this mentor for -- a whole
community. As a voice of the women, I want
to try and abolish some outdated cultures
like female genital mutilation. I will use
the authority that I will have as a doctor to
fight for the right of the women. So my
getting a degree means so much to my
community.
MS. NKADORI: I definitely have to
be a doctor and go back there and help them
out because they need me. I'm doing my
undergrad in Chicago State, and that's the
foundation that I'm building to -- you know,
that will lead me to my medical school.
Being a Maasai girl who is a doctor, I mean,
I'll be the first one, so you can imagine how
that will mean to the whole community.
I'll give it back to
them as much as the -- they need me and as
much as they supported me.
MS. KISAI: I want to go to a
medical school and study medicine. I might
probably do internal medicine and I will be
going back to Kenya to help those people
because I have to, it's not choice. I have
to go back and help these people back in
Kenya, and if we keep brain draining the
country then we're not going to help it.
MS. CONTEH: One of the major
things that I always tell all the students,
especially the Kenyan girls, is that never
forget where you come from, never forget your
culture, gain a western education, go back
and change the world, but if you lose that
part of you, you're nothing in Africa. And I
tell them, know that women are the custodian
of African tradition and history. Once that
is lost, you are lost, I don't care who you
are.
MS. KAELO: I am the culture, so I
am myself, I am the Maasai, I am whatever I
will be, I'll always remain myself.
MS. KISAI: You know, you cannot forget
your culture.
MS. DANIEL: We've learned from
them and they've learned from us, and so it's
been a mutual sharing, and I hope that when
they leave us, they will have a great
appreciation of American life and democracy,
and we will have a better understanding and
appreciation, and sensitivity to their
culture as well.
MR. OLEKINA: We are all committed.
We're doing these things not because we have
to do them, not because it's a job, but
because it's something that must be done to
be able to guarantee the future of our
people.
MS. KAELO: Maasai Education
Discovery, USAID, and Chicago State
University, I definitely attribute my success
to them.
MS. NKADORI: Well, USAID, you
know, Dr. Moten, and their finance to MED, to
us, they have really helped us, and they
definitely motivated me and challenged me to
achieve my goals.
MS. KISAI: It's an awesome
move to promote the girls education and let
girls see and the community see that girls
are just an important asset that cannot be
let down. I'm definitely going to be a
mentor, they are going to be seeing me
everywhere, because I'm going to let these
girls know that they're strong, they're
powerful, they can do just absolutely
anything.
Talking Walls - Madrasa Early Childhood Development
MS. RASHID: "Madrasa" in Arabic
means school. The Madrasa program is based
on voluntarism, and that's an Islamic
principle of, you need to give to the
community. Using the Koran, we get the
community to really think about how important
it is to start with early childhood
education. The Prophet said, go look for
education and give education to both boys and
girls, and that as a human being, you need to
start from the cradle to the grave. At
Madrasa, we bring in the whole idea of early
childhood, what it means, and how do we
invest so that tomorrow, we have a better
society.
MS. YUSUF: In the beginning, I
found that teaching was very hard. I didn't
know where to begin but now, after getting
the skill and reading books, now I can see
that teaching is very easy.
MS. RASHID: This school started in
1999, and it's still going on well.
OPEN TITLE
MS. RASHID: We had
to find a way of getting Muslim parents to
give us their kids so that they could start
pre-school, and since in any Muslim
community, you'll find a Koranic Madrasa and
a mosque, these were safe places to start
mobilizing communities to do this. Then they
identify women in their communities who are
willing to take up that training, so they
will be trained as teachers.
MS. YUSUF: This school, how it
began, the community called the meeting
inside the mosque where they discussed how
they should start a pre-school. After that,
we started inside the mosque, as our class.
MS. RASHID: But what about
managing, who is going to manage the school,
and so they come in and select, within the
larger community, representatives who will
volunteer to be trained and to participate in
the management of the school. Another thing
that we also do is to ask communities to start
the registering of their premises as a
pre-school with the Ministry of Education.
We started working very actively with EMACK,
that's part of USAID, and we work together,
helping the teachers in the training, helping
the school management committee, working with
parents, and also refurbishing the schools,
initiating a feeding program, and all the
refresher courses that these teachers have
had is through funding from USAID, through
EMACK.
MS. YUSUF: Through their
trainings, whatever we get there, we came
back to our community, sit with the
community, and implement whatever we've
learned. We learned the different topics,
teaching skills, material developing,
community involvement, and still we are
continuing training.
MS. RASHID: In active learning, we
call it mamacholasu, the first "ma," we call
it material, and then the second "ma" is
manipulation, the "cho" is choice, the "la"
is the language, and "su" for support. What
kind of support is the adult, in the
classroom and at home, providing for this
child. So we say wherever you are, in or
outside the classroom, you must have
mamacholasu, which is mother, with you,
that's what we mean by active learning.
Talking walls is what you can see
right here. The walls are so colorful,
there's so much messages on them, and you
don't need a book, you just need the walls
and they can talk to you, because a kid
would go around, move, touch, feel. So you
need to have active and very colorful walls
that you -- you keep refurbishing on and of
each time, so that children can learn from
the environment.
MS. YUSUF: I enjoy teaching the
children, and also through teaching here and
going to the training, I have learned a lot.
MS. RASHID: In any community, if
you want things to really be sustained, if
you want any intervention to continue as well
as expand, you need to involve the community
from the first stage. When we go to the
communities, we talk about partnership and
not sponsors. We say that we are partners in
this work, so you need to do your bit, and we
need to do our bit and then we can move
along.
Listen & Learn: Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI)
MR. HENNING: Reaching children
that are not in school is a very important
activity. There are thousands of children
that do not have the opportunity to enter a
formal school system, either there is not a
place for them or they do not have the
finances or the schools are too far apart,
and so the program we have is called
Interactive Radio Instruction, and they can
listen to a program twice a day. It's
structured, it follows the curriculum of the
Ministry of Education and they can be guided
through their educational programs.
MR. TREWBY: The programs are
developed by qualified teachers with
technical assistance from the project and
they are really good quality, they use
appropriate teaching methods, they are
interactive so that the children are up and
participating, they're learning by doing, not
just by sitting there and listening to the
teacher. They really do learn. We use wind
up radios, so you don't have to pay for any
batteries, it's just manpower.
MR. HENNING: They have a mentor
there, a teacher from the village who helps
them, but the radio offers the continuity and
kind of a fixed program that they can follow.
MR. CHIBAWE: As teachers at this
center, we come from the community. We do
understand what the children are going through,
the problems that they are going through, we
live with them. So when they are here, at
school, we would want to give them maximum
hospitality, we would want them to feel at
home. We share experiences, and our aim at
the end of the day, is to give out the best
to the children. Most of them are orphaned
from HIV AIDS. So without this IRI center,
it would have been very difficult for some of
the children from this community to access
education.
(Children's voices)
MR. CHIBAWE: To me, as an
individual, and I think to the community at
large, it's a big plus. These children are
very excited, very happy, so enthusiastic,
very much willing to learn.
MR. TREWBY: Because this has been
so effective without the school children, and
because there are so many government schools
which are understaffed, the government
decided that they would try this program in
those schools. And so last year, we helped
the ministry by training teachers in a number
of schools in seven different districts in
Zambia. And we found that the children who were
listening to the program made very
significant gains in Numeracy and English.
Also more of the children stayed in schools,
whereas other schools were loosing children.
We also found that there were significant
gains for girls. The programs specifically
say to the teacher, "Now ask a girl." There
seems to be a general tendency the boys will
be the more forward ones, whereas the radio
programs insist the girls also participate.
MS. BANDA: It's very effective, and
it makes them very sharp. Because one, it
improves their listening skills. You wait
for the radio first, they tell you what
you're supposed to tell the children, and
they'll give you seconds to explain that to
the children. They enjoy it, especially the
music that is there, the beats that I put on
the music, and they really dance to the
tunes. We have our teachers guide, you have
to read that book a day before you go to
class, and prepare all the teaching aids that
are needed.
The biggest benefit of this radio
is they tell me what I should do as a
teacher. We do four subjects, Social
Studies, Science, Mathematics and
Languages.
MS. MALISOPE: We learned our
Social Studies, and a subject which I like so
much is Science, because when I finish
school, I want to be a scientist. I think
you can't succeed without education, and the
radio class is fun.
MR. TREWBY: There are over 900
centers throughout the country, and about
nearly 2,000 volunteers doing the
facilitating. And all together, this is
reaching at the moment, over 60,000 children.
MR. CHIBAWE: I feel like --
education is one thing that I can really give
to a child. If I was rich, it would not be
enough for me to give money to somebody, but
if I give education, I think that I would
have done something tremendous.
Acting Together: - Student Alliance for Female Education (SAFE)
MR. HENNING: In Zambia, 16 percent
of the population is impacted by AIDS, that's
one in six people have AIDS. It's in all our
lives, every family has been affected.
MR. KAMUMMWA: People in the communities,
meaning the teachers, the parents and even
the pupils themselves are affected by the
pandemic.
MR. GRAYBILL: Almost all
government basic schools have what they call
anti-AIDS clubs. As a part of our work in
scholarships with a local NGO here called
FAWEZA, they have their own variant of
anti-AIDS clubs called SAFE clubs, Student
Alliance for Female Education is the acronym.
So that aside from equity and gender issues
about girls education and so on, they are
also focused on the HIV AIDS issue.
(Begin Audio Clip)
VOICES: Okay, group 1, group 2,
group 3, got some questions for you? Is it
possible to be just friends with the opposite
sex or not? I'm giving you five minutes to
discuss.
(End Audio Clip)
MS. KASANDA: The Student Alliance
for Female Education, SAFE clubs, these are
the clubs that look after life skills and
mentor/peer education, positive gender relations
among girls and boys.
MR. GRAYBILL: A lot of the kids
who receive the scholarships are trained as
HIV AIDS peer educators in their schools and
in their communities, where they are doing
outreach activities to try to mitigate and to
prevent the impacts of HIV AIDS.
(Begin Audio Clip)
VOICE: This game helps us to know
about HIV AIDS, one way to avoid getting HIV
is to abstain totally from sex, and the
answer is yes.
VOICE: Because if you abstain,
that way you have a free mind, let's stick to
our principles.
VOICE: They say prevention is
better than cure, we don't really have a cure
for the HIV, but that what can you do to
prevent yourself from getting the virus. Yes Precious?
VOICE: Sticking to one partner.
VOICE: Sticking to one partner,
you stick to one partner --
VOICE: If you're not married?
VOICE: Yes.
VOICE: No, no, no.
(Laughter)
NOMSA: We've got a poster there
which says, tell your friends that trust alone
is not enough. So sticking to one partner is
not enough. A condom is for married people,
we are not married. Now, we believe that
girls are the people who are more vulnerable
in the society. And we believe that if a
girl child is not highly esteemed, a girl
child can never go anywhere.
MS. KUMENDA: I had a very low self
esteem, but because of the exposure I got
from SAFE club, I am able to stand in front
of thousands of people and talk properly.
STUDENT: We should stop stigma,
for example you cannot get HIV by greeting or
by hugging a person who is HIV positive. A
friend who is HIV positive is still my
friend, and I really have to stand by that
person.
MS. HABEENZU: The SAFE club is all
about teaching the girls to share, and a way of
trying to prepare them for the life after
school.
MS. MTONGA: In SAFE, we try to
look at the root, instead of the leaves. If
we chop off the leaves and say don't have
sex, abstain, the tree would still grow more
leaves, you see. So SAFE, what is doing
right now, even for me, is chopping off the
roots of certain bad attitudes that will lead
to other bad things, so it's doing a great
job.
MS. MISHANGA: And the whole SAFE
club guys and girls thingy, we get to
interact, we get to talk, socialize and
everything, we get more assertive, I think,
because you know you get used to guys and
stuff. So if you want to say no, you say no,
without being shy and you know, that --
losing that confidence stuff. So I like, for
example, the discussions we've had, we've had
self respect, assertiveness, being passive,
aggressive and all those things, so it really
does help.
MS. KASANDA: We realize that if we
don't carry the boys together with the girls,
then the girls might be empowered, but the
boys are not being empowered.
NOMSA: It is so surprising that
we'll find guys in here, but I can assure you
that the guys that you're seeing here are the
people we believe are backing us. They
believe even girls can do something in the
society. And that's how come they joined us,
because they want to back us up as their
sisters. We believe they're the best, and we
call them our brothers.
(Applause)
STUDENT: When you put a lamp in
your room, the light is spread to all parts
of the room. It's the same with the SAFE
club, whatever you learn here, you extend it
to your friends. So those people who you
educate, in turn they also educate other
people, so in the end, you can even change
the whole nation.
(Singing)
NOMSA: We also carry out some
drama in the SAFE club. It's one of the ways
we sensitize to our fellow youths out there.
(Begin Audio Clip)
VOICE: Daughter, sit down.
VOICE: Well, mummy, how am I
supposed to move out there in the streets,
knowing that my own father is HIV positive.
Mummy, you don't understand?
VOICE: I do understand. So you
sit down and let us -- he is still your
father, you have to accept him whether HIV
positive or not.
VOICE: If I go around
discriminating you, refusing you as my
father, I'll be called a fool. Daddy, you're
still my father, I will fight AIDS with you, I
can do it.
(End Audio Clip)
MS. SICHILIMA: Through things like
what you saw today, the drama, they're able
to reach out to the community, so that the
community can learn from what the teachers
know.
(Voices): AIDS why have you taken away all my parents
Leaving me behind suffering - virgin power, virgin pride,
virgin power, virgin pride…
STUDENT: I noticed that you
educate a women and you educate a lot of
people, because you won't keep quite about
it. Like someone said, that if you want to
send out a message, either telephone,
telegram, or tell a woman, you know. And I
noticed that when women stand up to speak,
people listen. They do pay extra attention.
I've noticed that in here and everywhere
else. So when you educate a woman, she won't
keep it in the pocket.
Community is Key
MODERATOR: The goal of USAID's
Africa Education Initiative is to improve
lives through learning. Education is the
hope for African children, and through
scholarships, teacher training and textbooks,
AEI strives to reach all who are in need.
But it is only with the involvement and
dedication of the local community that these
advances can be made and maintained.
MR. GRAYBILL: CHANGES is an
acronym that means Communities Supporting
Health, HIV AIDS, Nutrition, Gender Equity
and Education in Schools. And a lot of it
funded with AEI funding. The "C" of changes
has been communities, a heavy emphasis in the
original CHANGES program as well in the
CHANGES-2 has been on mobilizing communities,
educating them on the things we're doing. If
we don't get the communities on board and
involved, a lot of what we do in the schools
is not likely to have much impact.
MR. KAMUMMWA: In all our schools
we have parent teacher associations, which
also bring together the teachers and the
communities, so that they look at the issues
concerning these school. So the communities
are quite involved.
MS. SICHILIMA: It is important to
get the community involved, because the
children are coming from the community. So
the communities are the ones who know the
problems they're facing. And once they come
up with the problems, they're able to come up
with solutions. So at the end of the day,
I'm going to have a quality education in our
basic schools. So we witnessed through
theater and songs and poetry, the community
and the school working together, hand in
hand, they are able to teach each other on
HIV AIDS, and also on other education issues.
STUDENT: Youths, I urge you to
abstain. Abstinence is the only remedy so
far. Youths, I encourage you to put more
effort on your school's studies, if you are
to be leaders of tomorrow.
COMMUNITY LEADER: Children now a days are
a bit neglected, that's why you find a lot of
street kids. We're trying to prevent this by
encouraging children to be participating in
some of these issues, minus this, children,
definitely will go astray. Without this
gathering, many parents and children might
not have known what is taking place as far as
School Community partnership is concerned.
WOMAN: So I'd say parents are
involved at school level, even at community
level. They are able to even use the local
resources, to do simple things like you -- to
have safe water, and also to have small
gardens and orchids, so that they can improve
on the nutrition for their children. Because
if their children are not healthy in school,
then they cannot concentrate on their
learning. And we give small grants to the
communities, that's their parents, or the
community-based organizations, and the school
clubs, so that they are able to sort out
those problems in their communities.
MS. DENAKPO: Bassoul is an island
in the region of Funjun (?) in Senegal. Our
project is called the Projet d' Appui a l'
Enseignement Moyen, which means support to
middle school. And we are involved in three
regions in Senegal, and we're building middle
schools, and we're working with the
communities and all the other stakeholders
around the schools. USAID provides the
funding in their agreement with the Ministry
of Education in Senegal.
At the community level, we work
with people who are -- elected officials who
are in charge of managing community
resources, we work with parents associations.
Often there are influential women and men who
are leaders in the community, we involve them
in the process of deciding where the school
should be built, how many classes it should
be, but we are also working with them to
promote girls education, because we want them
to send their girls to school and keep them
in school.
Once we got the schools in place
and the buildings there, then our big focus
became teacher training, training the
principals and continuing to work with
communities. Bassoul never had a middle
school, so we were very excited when it was
selected as a site, because it's very
difficult for children who live in those kind
of island environments to be able to go back
and forth to a larger middle school that
might be somewhere else. They have to take a
boat, there have been accidents and
deaths among children who are traveling back
and forth from school.
So once the site was selected, we
even had some problems in Bassoul, because
there were two communities that had kind of an
ongoing feud over the last 10 or 15 years,
but they finally came to see the importance
of that school for all of their children, and
ever since we started building, we've had
great cooperation from the community, they're
very active, it's very important to them.
MS. DJANKO: We want to thank USAID
for improving conditions in this village by
building this school. We, the women, have
been in this process from the foundation,
from the very beginning in one way or the
other. We understand, even more than the
children, that this school's necessary for
them. They are taking advantage of it, but
they don't understand what it means to them
and their future. So we're making sure that
they understand the importance of this
school.
MR. SENE: You can see in the face
of people here a sense of satisfaction, of
honor, and they are proud. Since the first
day, the United States aid came to build this
college, all the people had been involved in
the working. The secondary school attracts
not only Bassoul, but we had in the community
many villages coming here. Being together,
the children of many villages, they began to
learn what they are to do tomorrow for this
Republic of Senegal.
MR. BA: You can see it even
here and everywhere. If education is not
something that is celebrated, and the
community feel that it is important and the
kids will not feel that is important. But I
think it is very important that the community
come to celebrate the success at the end of
the school year, they come from time to time
to discuss curriculum, to discuss how the
school is managed, to discuss activities for
the kids.
MS. DENAKPO: Communities are
really psyched about this, and they want
these schools there, and they are willing to
do a lot to make it happen.
MR. SENE: We will, forever, do all
what we can, to have this school be like it
is. That is very beautiful, very
successful, women, men, children, boys girls,
everybody will put his hand to lead this
school together.
Making It Through Mentoring
MODERATOR: In Africa, about 40
million children of primary school age are
not enrolled in school. More than half of
these children are girls. The Ambassadors
Girls' Scholarship Program is working to
bridge this gender gap. Part of President
Bush's $600 million Africa Education
Initiative, this program is providing 550,000
scholarships by 2010 mainly to African girls at the
primary and secondary levels. Students also
receive the benefit of mentors, who share
positive role models, and promote
self-esteem.
MS. BENJAMIN: Mentoring is a key
component to our scholarship package. The
Academy for Educational Development is a
large NGO, U.S. based, in Washington. AED is
one of the prime contractors for the
Ambassador's Girls' Scholarship Program
funded through the USAID. We're working in
the poorer rural areas, our mentors are
incredibly important. I mean, this is not
just about paying school fees or giving a
uniform or buying a textbook. It's
important that we support these girls.
Mentors are able to do that.
MS. AHMED: I do mentor them. I come
visit them, I advise them, I tell them the
importance of education, I tell them the
importance of discipline. There are few
role models, especially in my community, so
this is -- I'm really proud, in future we're
going to be wonderful.
MS. KIMANI: You know that you can
make it. We talked about self-confidence and
self-esteem, we talked about it?
SPEAKER: Yes.
MS. KIMANI: Have the morale, I can
make it, no matter how things are, I can make
it.
MS. KYALO: We are talking about
that opportunity you've been given, you know.
And if you lose this opportunity, I don't
know where you're going to get another
opportunity. You want to be the leaders of
the future, yeah, are we together?
SPEAKER: Yes.
MS. KYALO: Yeah, so I know you're
not going to let us down.
SPEAKER: Yes.
MS. KYALO: Why I became a mentor
is because I never had somebody to mentor me.
And do you know what happened to me is that
when I finished my school from form four, I was
forced by my dad to choose the wrong career,
and because of that it disrupted my education
and my life. So I was -- I have that zeal to
talk to the girls, to make sure they can be
-- they are not going to make such a mistake
that I made. I want them to be very clear of
what they want in life, are you together?
SPEAKER: Yes.
MR. KYALO: We told you about
abstaining, not only for HIV, what else?
Unwanted pregnancy, what else?
SPEAKER: Other disease.
MR. KYALO: Other diseases, not
only HIV, yeah?
SPEAKER: Yes.
MS. ADHIAMBO: I live in Kibera,
with my uncle, after my dad and mum passed
away. And I was given the opportunity to be
sponsored by KEPAWE, and that's why I'm here,
and I'm proud of it. The mentors always help
us, they advise me not to do what is wrong,
but always stand on my right. Always speak
of the right thing, yeah. To me education
is life, no life without education, that is
my motto and that is what I believe.
MS. GOHOLE: Despite the fact that
I'm living in Kibera, I don't care about the
-- environment, but I just want to make
my future be successful. My favorite subject
is Maths, I want to be a pilot when I grow
up. I don't want to be someone who I -- I am
not. So I just want to achieve -- if I am a
girl I just want to be a girl, not someone
else, by doing things which are not supposed
to be done in the society.
MR. OTIENO: Kibera is a big slum
and most children here are very needy. Here
the teachers are trying their best to make a
child to come from the slum and at least be
somebody who can also help in the society.
USAID and KEPAWE has come to rescue our
children in this school. Because these
children now are able to -- they have hopes,
they have been given the hope in life.
MS. ADHIAMBO: Me, I would wish to
be successful in life after being educated.
In order for me to have the confidence and
courage, support the young ones who are still
following us, because they need our support.
MS. WRIGHT: Education is a key
element in long term sustainable development.
If children, particularly the girl child is
educated, she is more likely to send her
children to school, they are more likely to
be healthy, they are more likely to be more
productive citizens. As a result of the
influence of their educated mother. So all
of the indicators are positive, all of your
returns on your investment, if you wish to
speak from an economic perspective, are
overwhelmingly positive. And it's the right
thing to do, it's the right thing to do.
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