In Kenya, students with the highest grades attend universities to become doctors, lawyers and engineers, not teachers. Teachers are undervalued and extremely underpaid. So, few quality teachers emerge from university, and those who do, typically require additional training.
The task of training teachers can be a difficult one. The first months of our retraining are spent unlearning outdated and heavy-handed techniques. We create an environment that stimulates passion to educate young minds. This environment has inspired our teachers to become amongst the best in Kenya.
What difference does retraining our teachers make?
The answer is an easy one – well, two, actually…
Mary and Peter – siblings, brought to us by a local Pastor a few years ago.
Their father was killed in a tribal clash while their mother was pregnant with Peter. Due to the stigma of the being an unmarried mother of two, the community offered little help. To support her family, the young mother trained as a seamstress in Nairobi, but soon fell victim to the lure of quick money made through prostitution.
She died of complications from HIV less than two years later, leaving the two children she loved and made hard choices for now orphaned.
For a short time, the children lived with grandparents, where they traded school books for garden utensils. When they entered the Oasis Program they were undernourished in spirit, soul and body.
Though stories like Mary and Peter’s are common in Kenya, these two have defied the cycle of illiteracy and poverty. Today, not only are they in the appropriate grade level, but they are leading their respective classes.
14-year-old Mary is bright, articulate, and loves to study. Her current grades have placed her 25% higher than the national average. While Peter, being the active, smart 10-year-old that he is, maintains an average that is 20% higher than 5th graders across Kenya.
Together, we’re using education and your generous funding to overcome cycles of uncertainty and hardship. By pouring into our teachers, we are, in turn, facilitating a bright future for the kids of Kenya.
On behalf of our Oasis Family, Thank You.
Michael Hindes
Managing Director
