About the School

The Inception of The Kibera School for Girls

Born and raised in Kibera, Kennedy Odede, Executive Director of Shining Hope for Communities, saw the bleak prospects available to young women first hand. The eldest in a family of eight, he saw his three younger sisters struggle to achieve an education and watched as two became teenage mothers and were forced to drop out of school. He witnessed young women lose their hopes of ever attaining an education and leaving the slum, as they were forced into commercial sex work at early ages. In Kennedy’s childhood, stories like those of his friend Esther Akumu were all too common. Esther did not have the opportunity to go to school and thus became a prostitute at the age of thirteen to earn a living. Two years later, after becoming infected with HIV/AIDS, she was raped and murdered by a former client. In Kibera young girls and women are often raped and Kennedy saw frequent domestic violence and cultural subjugation of women—acts that are more likely to occur when girls are denied education. As far back as he can remember, Kennedy dreamt of starting a school for girls in Kibera dedicated to providing a superior education and teaching young girls of their value and promise. Years later Kennedy met Wesleyan student Jessica Posner when she worked with SHOFCO in Kenya. Jessica was also moved by the plight of young women in Kibera. She remembers once stopping a five-year-old girl running through a pile of trash and human waste and asking her why she wasn’t in school. The child responded: “school is only a dream and dreams don’t come true.” Jessica and Kennedy began to work together, inspired by the pressing need for educational reform, to make Kennedy’s lifelong dream of building a school for girls come true. In the spring of 2009 Jessica and Kennedy received the Kathryn Wasserman Davis 100 Projects for Peace Grant from Wesleyan University. Through the support of this grant and generous donations from many who have also been moved by this project The Kibera School for Girls will at long last become a reality.

About the Project

Although the UN estimates that more than 1.5 million people live within Kibera’s two square mile area, the Kenyan Government views Kibera as an illegal settlement and therefore does not provide any services or schools. The only schools in Kibera are informally run and lack proper classroom management procedures and resources. Children are often beaten for not knowing answers, and lessons are geared towards rote memorization and passing the country’s standardized exams, a feat which no Kibera school has ever accomplished. Our school is different. The Kibera School for Girls is the FIRST school for girls in Kibera and the ONLY free school in the area. Our school represents a movement towards educational reform in Kenya. The Kibera School for Girls teaches its students to love learning. We do not teach to the exam, we do not believe in memorization, and we do not believe in corporal punishment. We believe that children should be actively engaged in their own learning. The adults who work with children should see themselves as facilitators more than supervisors. Students are taught HOW to learn and trust their own decision making to foster independence. Our curriculum is partially inspired by Montessori, although primarily based on Integrated Day philosophy, which emerged from post-war Britain when without supplies or schools students literally took to the streets to learn and question. The curriculum focuses on allowing children to develop passions with an emphasis on multicultural studies. In addition our curriculum is tailored to help girls deal with the specific pressures and problems they encounter in Kibera. There is an emphasis on health education, women’s empowerment and AIDS education. Teachers are also equipped to counsel the children and provide unconditional encouragement and support. Click here to learn more about our curriculum and educational practices. The Kibera School for Girls will serve students in pre-kindergarten through 6th grade, and will have fifteen students per grade, for a total of 120 students (eventually expanding to 8th grade to serve 150 students). In order to serve the neediest and most academically motivated children our students are selected through a competitive application process that asses their desire and dedication to learn, academic aptitude, and financial situation. All of our students are academically gifted and unable to pay even a small fee to attend school. We focus on serving talented students most vulnerable to sexual abuse and prostitution. Over half of our students are street children or orphans, and many are HIV positive. To qualify for admittance parents must be unemployed and without familial or other resources. Our school will grow with our students, meaning that during our first year we will start with pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and first grade students. To meet the students click here. The Kibera School for Girls is staffed by an experienced passionate Principal and outstanding committed teachers. All members of the staff are women from Kibera to provide positive female role models. To meet the staff click here. Ultimately The Kibera School for Girls will benefit the community in the following ways:

• The school will offer girls a high-quality formal education, as well as daily nourishment, self-empowerment, and a refuge from the pressures of the slum. By preparing students for higher education and skilled jobs, this school will keep the girls out of prostitution and offer them a path out of the slum.
• This school will enable girls to be academically qualified for scholarships at prestigious government boarding schools, and eventually attend college.
• The school will have a library and services open to the community, and will offer employment to adult women of Kibera.
• By providing education and empowerment, this school will be the first step towards a future in which these young women can return to Kibera with the skills and foundation needed to reform the problems of their community.

The Shining Hope Community Compound

The Kibera School for Girls is in the Shining Hope Community Compound. This compound also includes The Kibera Free Health Clinic (the first and only free clinic in Kibera), The Dennis Silver Memorial Family Library, The Women’s Microfinance Empowerment Workshop, and the SHOFCO Youth Center. To read more about these ground breaking projects, part of a comprehensive approach to poverty eradication, please go here.

Facilities

The Kibera School for Girls will have its own secure compound within the slum, providing both students and the community with invaluable resources. The school compound contains: Classroom building with six classrooms that utilize the outdoors, a Principal’s office, a teacher’s lounge and a storage space. The Kibera School for Girls Family Library that is also open at night for students to study in (as students do not have power in their homes), as well as to the community. An outdoor eating and gathering space. A purified water tank. Two eco-friendly pit latrines. A sustainable vegetable and chicken farm. All buildings are designed to be eco-friendly and with sustainable features. Construction begins July 15th and the school will open on August 21st. To read more about the construction plans follow along on our blog.

Sustainability

The school will teach children about taking care of the environment, and put these P1010519principles into practice by having a farm to grow its own vegetables, raise chickens, and improve the soil in this area. Because of the large amount of garbage throughout the slum, the school will organize community clean-ups. The latrines will be the first eco-friendly toilets in Kibera. Furthermore, once built The Kibera School for Girls will sustain itself at the level of basic expenses through several microfinance projects run by parents of the school and members of the community. To meet basic operating costs microfinance projects will include: The sale of water from the purified water tank to members of the community. This will also provide an essential service, as currently community members purchase unsanitary water from private vendors at a high price. The sale of eggs and chickens from our farm at much lower prices than those of private vendors, providing the community with affordable nutrition. The sale of vegetables from our farm, which will also provide the community with an accessible and affordable source of nutrition. Highly conservative calculations reveal that the yearly profits from these activities will pay for the minimum amount needed to pay a staff and meet basic operating costs without charging students. However, providing high quality nutrition to students, first rate programming, medical care, and innovative classroom materials requires your support.

Community Involvement

The school will serve as an active meeting place and center for the Kibera community. The school itself will be run by both the parents of the students, members of the community, and an outstanding principal and teaching staff of women from Kibera. Over ten community meetings have already taken place to discuss plans for the school. This project is ultimately an initiative run by the community, for the community. Because the people of Kibera generated this idea, they are eager to have ownership of it. The microfinance from the school will boost Kibera’s economy, providing affordable and accessible services. As the only free education in Kibera, and the only school for girls, community members will do anything to ensure the school’s long-term success and will benefit from the library and other public services. NON-DISCRIMINATION POLICY
REGARDING EMPLOYEES, STUDENTS, AND
RECIPIENTS OF SOCIAL AND COMMUNITY SERVICES SHINING HOPE FOR COMMUNITIES, INC.

• ADMINISTERING ALL FACETS OF THE KIBERA SCHOOL FOR GIRLS—INCLUDING ITS ADMISSIONS, CURRICULUM OFFERINGS, SCHOLARSHIPS AND LOANS PROGRAM, ATHLETIC AND EXTRA-CURRICULAR PROGRAMS, AND ESTABLISHMENT AND ENFORCEMENT OF STUDENT RIGHTS AND PRIVILEGES—,
• HIRING, AND SETTING AND IMPLEMENTING TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF EMPLOYMENT, AND
• PROVIDING SOCIAL AND COMMUNITY SERVICES,