Projects

Okoa Binti Safe House

SAFEHOUSE

The Safe House provides accomodation for very vulnerable girls. The girls are provided with basic needs as well as a providing a comfortable environment for them to learn life skills. The girls are looked after by the matron. There are a total of seven girls living in the safe house at the moment.

Caroline and Esther with the sponsored students at Karibuni 

Update on sponsored students progress 2011

Homework club

Updates on students awarded scholarships in January 2011

Vera is a 14 year old girl with both parents who are peasant farmers in Ndhiwa. She is the 5th born in a family of eight children and is actually the first to join secondary school in her family. She needs extra support in terms of money to purchase paraffin for studying. Vera wants to be a teacher when she grows up. Vera was selected to join Raphedhi Mixed Secondary school and she acknowledges she could not have joined secondary school had Team Kenya not have supported her. She is now happy to be in a high school 
Vera  admits that her life has changed for the better since she joined form one and started living at the safe house.

Homework club May 2011

The sponsored students participated in the homework club activities. The activities were all geared towards making the students improve in their academic performance and they included:  Personal revision where every student personally did his/her own studies focussing on areas of weaknesses  Group discussions which were an interactive session that enabled the students to learn from one another.

One on One guidance and counselling: this was done when the students were handing in their report forms and were advised on how they could improve. During this session, it was discovered that some students had problems at home or school which hindered them from performing well.

Innocent - Whitley Bay High school sponsored student

The BCC (Nike) football project

Girls Football This is a girls’ football project towards Behaviour Change Communication in the fight against HIV/AIDS. The activities under this project included: Recruitment of the professional football coach and Community Health Care Worker,  formation of football teams and training, setting up a league timetable, community mobilisation, purchase of the football kits and health education.  

Formation and training of football teams Football teams were formed and they include the Team Kenya’s partner’s schools and the Ndhiwa Girl Support Group. The project will hence focus on six football teams i.e. Arina, Alara, Pala High, Pala Primary, Bongu and Ndhiwa Girl Support Group. Balls were issued to every partner school. The football coach trains the Ndhiwa Girl Support Group team over the weekend i.e Saturdays and Sundays when they meet. During the weekdays, the football coach trains the other girls from the partner schools.

Setting up a league timetable A League timetable has been prepared by the professional football coach. The leagues are supposed to start during the month of October. The first league will be held at Pala Primary School Grounds and will be between the Ndhiwa Girl Support Group Team and Alara Primary girls’ football team.

Health education Health talks have been taking place alongside football training sessions. This ensures that as much as the girls have fun by playing football, they are educated on various issues especially reproductive health matters. This is done to provide girls with factual and in-depth information concerning their reproductive health responsibilities and rights.  

The Referree!!

Update from Caroline April  2011

 Eight of the girls in the NIKE football program trained by the football coach were selected to represent the entire Ndhiwa District in the District’s competition and five girls from the team selected to represent Nyanza province in the national competition to be held at the beginning of the month of April.

Padi Bora: eco -friendly  reusable  sanitary  pads

Milicent making pads

Padi is a Swahili word which means pad while bora means better. The project is about reusable cotton sanitary towels. The main objective of this project is to provide an alternative to the expensive disposable sanitary towels that a majority of the girls cannot afford due to the high poverty levels in the region.

The long term goal of the project is keeping the adolescent girls in school throughout the school going days. This is because a majority of girls tend to stay at home when they are having their periods because they lack an effective material to protect themselves during menstruation.

During the month of September 2010, focus was put on creating awareness about the cotton reusable sanitary towels (Padi Bora). The awareness raising was carried out alongside puberty and reproductive health education. Free samples were given to a few girls. In addition, other samples were given to the teacher in charge of the girls in the schools to be kept for emergency in case a girl unexpectedly experiences her periods while at school, then she will not have to ask for permission to go home and lose out on education. The puberty and reproductive health education sessions indicated that a majority of the girls don’t have factual information regarding their sexuality.

Interview of Vulnerable Girls at Arina Primary School Arina as one of the partner school was chosen due to concerns over the number of girls who drop out of school before sitting for their first national exams. In fact, this is the only year that Arina Primary School has registered 3 girls for the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) exams. A big number of girls drop out of school before reaching standard eight. Some of the girls are already mothers at tender ages, others have been forced to move in with new families after losing both parents, and some have been tormented by separation of parents and family conflicts. A majority of girls in this school come from poverty stricken families and thus have either resolved to survival sex or work for other people to earn income. These girls find it difficult to survive in school and hence resort to early marriages. In summary, these girls face the following problems:

• Lack of motivation as no girl in that school has ever reached standard eight.

  Poverty, killing the morale of studying due to predictable lack of secondary school fees
  Mockery by villagers who feel that girls are better off married than educated.

• Forced marriages, considering that many families depend on bridal wealth through dowry.
• Quite a number of girls stay at home during their monthly periods and hence miss out on school. Eventually, they drop out of school because they are embarrassed.

Update on the progress of the girls provided with extra support at Arina April 2011

Arina Primary School girls support group

The extra support provided to girls at Arina Primary has proved to positively reflect on their academic performances. All of the six girls supported under this program were able to note a considerable improvement in their academic performances. Though some of them just improved slightly the teachers feel that it is indeed a good sign that the girls are headed for excellence.
Edwina Is a 15 year old with a baby aged about one year. She is the fourth born in a family of six children. Her mother has been sick for quite a long time and is bed-ridden.The father also has a problem with his leg but manages to occasionally do some work if he is not in pain

She  loves football and is now a member of the girls’ football team at Arina Primary School. She loves maths and science.Edwina  says that she is more comfortable at school with the extra support she is getting from Team Kenya.

 She is certain that she cannot drop out of school now. She has been able to improve in her performance and she has promised to make good use of the lantern and the paraffin provided to improve further. She  wants to be a teacher when she finishes school, adream that she now says is achievable.

Jackline is also a teenage mother to a nine month old baby is 16 years old and is the only child. She is an orphan and currently lives with her grandmother who is taking care of other orphans as well, a task that is overwhelming for her since she does not have the financial means to take care of the children. Jackline has been able to note a tremendous improvement in her studies since the onset of the support

Ruth is a 17 year old and is an orphan. She lives with her grandparents who take care of her. She has benefited a lot from the programme as she says that her life was miserable before the support. She was practicing survival sex to be able to get her basic needs such as food and sanitary towels. She has been able to improve in her academic performance and her life is more comfortable now

Carbon Offsetting - Jiko Project: Fight Global Warming - reduce your carbon footprint and promote clean energy and sustainable solutions to poverty 

Pala Primary School tree nursery

What is Carbon Offsetting? Each of our everyday actions consumes energy and produces carbon dioxide emissions e.g. taking holiday flights, driving our cars, heating or cooling our homes and offices. 

Carbon Offsets can be used to compensate for the emissions produced by funding an equivalent carbon dioxide saving somewhere else. 

Voluntary carbon offsetting with Team Kenya can reduce the impact of our actions, help raise awareness of the issues and create brighter future for young people in Kenya including orphans and people living with HIV/AIDS.   

Our Carbon offsetting scheme includes providing ceramic Jiko’s, planting trees and providing training, advice & support to the community, relating to environmental conservation and protection, renewable energy including solar power & sustainable development. 

Traditional Cooking Methods - 3 stone cooking which uses a lot of wood and causes thick smoke and air pollution

Using ceramic Jiko’s and solar ovens can have a dramatic effect on energy usage, the environment and community health. The choking smoke from indoor wood fires causes respiratory disease - mainly pneumonia - which is the leading health hazard in Kenya and annually kills four to five million children worldwide. 

We may not be able to stop global warming, but we can help slow it down! 

Other projects currently receiving funding and support from Team Kenya:

Girls Support Group

NCEDP (computers, computer training, staff wages, internet costs, income generating activities, new building, Girls Support Group, sponsorship programme, digital photography, library)

- Pala School Enterprise Group farm
- Pala School Scouts and Guides
- Pala High School building and resources
- NCEDP football & netball teams
- KWDI weaving group

Pala Guides 
- Women's reading group
- Vocational training for vulnerable young women
- Girls Rights Campaign
- Water purification
- Sustainable agriculture including beekeeping, poultry, dairy farming
- Ceramic Jikos (energy saving stoves)
- Ndhiwa News (newsletter/ newspaper)
- Digital Photography
- Orphans feeding programme
- Karibuni after school club (counselling, advice, study groups)
- Karibuni Homework Club Nov 09

Karibuni Homework club Nov 09

The Homework Club

The Homework Club focuses on improving the academic standards of its members who are mostly the sponsored students. The attendance for the month of September has been excellent during the weekdays i.e. every Tuesday and Thursday from 1600 hrs to 1730 hrs. The students also meet over the weekends; either on Saturdays or Sundays as from 1000hrs to 1200hrs. The activities carried out include:

Personal studies which encouraged the spirit of self-reliance in acquiring knowledge.

Group discussion where they revised past papers. Their tutor guided them through the revision sessions. The group discussions also provide a platform for positive interaction and promoting a team spirit. 

One open forum was also conducted on how they could make good use of their homework sessions. The students also pointed out the need to be watching documentaries at the Resource Centre.