Kipawa is keen to support the parents and families as well as the children at Mukuyu School. Through the Family Empowerment Programme Kipawa funds there, parents are supported to start their own small businesses and receive education in finance, family planning and supporting their children.

In these pictures, you can see Joyce who has been helped to set up a stall selling fruit and vegetables and charcoal, and some parents attending one of the education seminars.

This September, the United Nations will commit to the new Sustainable Development Goals, which will succeed the Millennium Development Goals. The Sustainable Development Goals outline a new and ambitious worldwide effort to reduce poverty and hunger, improve health, enable equality, protect the planet and much more. Real progress will be elusive unless all children receive a quality education. Read here about how education is essential to the success of every one of the 17 new sustainable development goals. 

Kipawa is committed to improving the educational opportunities of the children in Ruiru, Kenya, by providing a feeding programme, improved sanitation and infrastructure in their school, counselling and other health initiatives, family empowerment programmes and secondary school sponsorship.

Click here to find out how you can help!

    

This article by Zoe Flood and Louis Quail in the Guardian newspaper today describes the desperate situations some people in Kenya find themselves and their families in. Kipawa works in a different part of Kenya, but this article explains how important feeding programmes in schools and other health and social work interventions are for getting children to attend school, allowing them to concentrate when they are there and helping their families to escape the extreme poverty they are living in. 

Thanks to Kipawa's generous donors, we are able to provide breakfast and lunch to all the children in Mukuya school in Kenya. We also provide, among other help, deworming medication, sanitary towels, counselling services, family empowerment assistance and, for some, sponsorship to attend secondary school. We have also helped to improve the school environment by improving several classrooms and building new toilet blocks. With your help, we are really making a difference to the lives of the children we work with. Thank you.

Read the full Guardian article here:http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/sep/01/kenya-mothers-children-eldoret-dump

This article from the BBC shows how vital the work that Kipawa is doing in Kenya is. The report shows that Kenya is in the bottom 10, worldwide, for the number of children attending school. 

The feeding programme established by Kipawa in Mukuya school means that the school roll there is now well over 600. The counselling, family empowerment and other health programmes mean that children who might have dropped out of school are helped to stay in school and benefit from their education. 

Read the full BBC story here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-25811704

If you can give anything, however small, to help this vital work, please donate here through Virgin Money Giving.

Kipawa founder and trustee Kirsty Welsh describes her recent visit to Mukuya school to see first hand how our donor's money is helping the children of Riuru:

"After a pretty hectic run up to our trip, my brother and I were dropped off at Edinburgh Airport at 4.30am with 150kg of bags full of all the donations and supplies so generously provided by Kipawa donors. A friend had arranged for KLM to give us extra baggage allowance but we exceeded even that!

After a brief stop in Amsterdam and an 8 hour flight we arrived in Nairobi at 9pm to a remarkably organised Kenyatta airport considering the summer fire had impacted most of the airport. Maaike and Chenge from Macheo had kindly come to collect us and before long we were on our way to Thika. After a good night’s sleep we set off for Mukuya School accompanied by the Macheo team, Maaike and Faith, who told us that the school were very excited about our visit and likened it to Christmas – I’m not sure we were going to live up to this expectation! As we drove along the dirt road to the school I was surprisingly emotional returning to Mukuya, as the school we talk about so much came into view.

We met with Mr Peter the Headmaster in his office and discussed the good progress that’s been made, before beginning our visit by checking in on the nursery classroom block which we funded the refurbishment of earlier in the year. By any Kenyan standards this is now a bright, lively classroom full of kids sitting at their tables keen to learn and play. I had been shocked to see young kids trying to play and learn in rooms with piles of rubble and crumbling walls so it was great to see such a transformation. We also gave out some of the smaller shoes that were generously donated by folks from Broomfield House and Marshgate Primary schools in Surrey, Lilypad Retail in Biggar and others.

It was great to meet Margaret, the new social worker funded by Kipawa, and Karen, our counsellor, and talk to them first hand to understand what they do day-to-day. When they showed us into a small, dark, bare room, which had been a storeroom, furnished with 2 plastic chairs, they told us how grateful they were to have a space to work in. The thought of Karen counselling vulnerable kids in this space immediately showed us that whilst we had made progress this year there is lots still to do and we must make sure that in 2014 there is a safe, warm, light place for the kids to go for counselling and support. A lot of the classrooms aren’t in much better shape with crumbling floors, no windows and 4 or 5 kids sharing a 2 person desk while trying to study for end of year exams. 

We briefly popped our heads into each classroom to say hi and were greeted warmly; again it was particularly nice to see both Class 4s in a much better environment than before, in their newly renovated classrooms. 

In true Kenyan style, the school had planned a presentation for us and as we walked out towards the garden in the middle of the school the 600 kids started singing. No matter how many times I experience this I don’t think it will stop taking my breath away as we were led to sit at the front with the headmaster. After the children had sung some songs and made some lovely speeches about how grateful they were for Kipawa’s support we presented a few of them with gifts for the school – books, stationery and sports equipment. One pair of football boots went to a boy who had had a poor attendance record at school. Since involving him in the school football team he has turned into a great role model with perfect attendance and is encouraging his friends to do the same. This has also sparked an idea that we can use sports and other activities to incentivise the children to attend school and inspire them to do well. Following the presentation it was great to see all the kids line up and enjoy their lunch, after all that’s the foundation of what we do – the feeding programme is what brings the children to school and allows us and the school to really start helping them.

As we were leaving, Margaret introduced us to Morgan, a boy in the nursery class who she had tracked down after he had stopped attending school due to ill health. After his parents separated, Morgan's mother could not afford to take him for ongoing treatment. Thanks to Margaret’s support, he has now resumed treatment and is being referred to Kenyatta National Hospital for an operation in January. Whilst the family still faces a lot of problems, at least we have been able to ensure he accesses the treatment he needs and is restored to good health. In 2014 we hope to fund Margaret to go beyond the school grounds and help pupils and vulnerable families by supporting them in whatever form that takes – accessing medical treatment, supporting parents or referring them to appropriate organisations.

We left Mukuya happy to see so much progress and full of new ideas and made the short trip to Ruiru Township Secondary School where five of Mukuya’s former pupils are now studying thanks to Kipawa sponsorship. After meeting with them and their teachers it’s clear that they value their education as it’s not something that they thought they would be able to carry on with. As we were interrupting the school day, we stayed for just a short visit but long enough to hear what our sponsorship means to them. We would love to help more children like these fulfil their potential by sponsoring them through secondary school.

My trips to Kenya will always give me a great perspective on our problems in the UK and make me more committed to supporting the children we work with in as many ways as I can. It certainly has given me the drive to undertake the next phase of planning and fundraising knowing its having so much impact." 

Today is World Toilet Day! 

Globally, 2.5 billion people have no access to a clean toilet. In developing countries, diseases related to poor sanitation are very common especially among young children. Clean toilets, if used properly, can prevent diseases like diarrhoea. Diarrhoea is believed to kill 1 child every 20 seconds in developing countries. 

And, did you know that women menstruate on average for 3000 days in their lifetime? This requires space for washing and cleaning. Especially for adolescent girls, clean and private toilet facilities at school strongly influence their performance, and increase the chance of attending school and completing their education.

Kipawa has provided a new toilet blocks for girls and boys at Mukuya School, as well as sanitary towels for the girls. This is having a real, positive effect on the children's education. Thank you for continuing to support Kipawa and making this vital work possible. 

Happy World Toilet Day!