Schools Around the World: Kenya
Sayyid Azim/AP
Some of the hundreds of parents and children line up to register at the Buru Buru 1 Primary School in Nairobi on the first day of the year Monday, Jan. 6, 2003, eager to capitalize on the electoral promise of free primary education made by newly-inaugurated President Mwai Kibaki.
Last week, we spoke with Alex Grossi, a young man who helped start the Kenya School Libraries Program, a nonprofit that collects books for libraries in Kenya’s schools.
Education in Kenya has been in the headlines quite a bit recently. On Monday, tennis star Serena Williams arrived in Kenya to open her second Serena Williams Secondary School, this one in Eastern Province, Kenya. Williams is a global ambassador for Hewlett Packard and has been on several charitable missions to the region.
On Tuesday, ABC7news.com reported on Kenya Dream, a class project at Cupertino High School. Students there adopted the Nthimbiri Secondary School in Kenya three years ago, with the aim of raising $100,000 for the school. So far, the students have raised $50,000.
In January, Ashley Seager reported for The Guardian on a new program to bring education to nomadic groups in Kenya. “My view is that people should not have to choose between their lifestyle and an education,” Mohamed Elmi, the minister for northern Kenya, told Seager. Now, 91 mobile schools have opened in the country, mostly in the north and east. Children begin lessons at 5:30 in the morning, study for a few hours, and then tend to grazing animals or gather water for the village. They may study again in the evening.
“The teacher is a member of the community and he travels with them,” Ibrahim Sheikh-Omar, the district education officer, told The Guardian. “This is very important.” (The program is reminiscent of a donkey-powered book mobile in Colombia, created to bring books to small villages in Colombia’s rural areas.)
But even with the great educational strides taking place in Kenya, the news on education there isn’t all positive. Also in January, Ambassador Michael Ranneberger, the top U.S. diplomat to Kenya, announced that the U.S. had suspended a $7 million program for Kenya’s Ministry of Education, due to corruption charges. Top education officials in Kenya were charged with misappropriating funds for the country’s free primary education initiative.
In 2003, the newly elected Kenyan government, under President Mwai Kibaki, made a “[g]iant step for Kenya’s schools” and abolished primary school fees, Africa Renewal, a publication of the United Nations, reported in 2005. As a result, approximately 1.3 million new students attended Kenya’s primary schools, bringing the country closer to the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) for education.
MDG was adopted by world leaders in 2000 to reduce poverty and increase development worldwide. As Africa Renewal explains, MDGs ask countries to provide primary education for all children, “achieve gender parity at all levels of education” and reduce adult illiteracy.
According to Africa Renewal, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan stressed the value of girls’ education in March 2005. “Study after study has taught us that there is no tool for development more effective than the education of girls,” Annan said. “No other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity, lower infant and maternal mortality, improve nutrition and promote health, including the prevention of HIV/AIDS. No other policy is as powerful in increasing the chances of education for the next generation.”
Hopefully, the corruption charges against Kenya’s education officials will be sorted out. Until then, the U.S., Britain and other donors will most likely continue “their criticism of corruption and the slow pace of reform in Kenya,” as CNN reported.
For a history of education in Kenya and an overview of the education system in Kenya today, visit the East Africa Living Encyclopedia, hosted by the African Studies Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
The Nation
The Guardian
findingDulcinea
CNN
Africa Renewal
East Africa Living Encyclopedia
