EDUCATION

When you ask orphans and at-risk children what they want most, the resounding answer is education and when you ask them what they specifically want to be when they grow up they talk of big dreams like Doctors, Lawyers, pilots, Engineers, nurses, judges, Presidents, Bishops, Teachers etc.

The Kenyan government implemented free primary education for all children in year 2003 resulting in the enrollment of 1.5 million children who previously did not attend school. As a result of this free education initiative, schools are facing congestion in classrooms with some single classrooms accommodating 90 pupils in density populated areas, lack of sufficiently trained teachers and inadequate training material ,resulting to poor classroom performance & national exams.

AMCC education programme strives to create an environment conducive to the increased participation of children in school and improved classroom and national exams performance. Programs facilitate education by providing direct support with accommodation, education, feeding, shelter, medical-care, school fees, school uniform, shoes etc for the orphans and at-risk children.

PRIMARY EDUCATION

Education is essential to a child’s success. It is the only true lasting hope for change. Without it the future Leaders, Doctors, Lawyers, Teachers and Pillars of the Nations will be left to lead the lifes their families has been destined to for countless generations.

The public primary school programs became unworkable , undesirable & tiresome due to overcrowding with some single classes holding over 90 pupils, with teachers teaching a 35 minutes lesson and a minimum of 7 lessons a day and 38 lessons in a five days week, resulting to teachers telling pupils to exchange assignments to mark for themselves.

In the 1990’s the pupils were overburdened with 11 subjects and they lost the desire to learn, The other factor is that the upgrading of some teachers from grade P1 to grade approved Teachers status 1 (ATS1) through corruption destroyed the teachers attitude due to a great salary gap difference. All these factors have affected the performance of pupils in the class 8 national exams. As they graduate from class eight most are but mere handouts, which discouraged all others down the line and they became lazy with no interest to study. This affects mostly the orphans and at-risk children because those parents and guardians who are well-up employs part-time teachers to teach their children in the evening, holidays and weekends or take them to the high cost private academies of which the orphans and at-risk children cannot afford.

AMCC programs include primary education activities to help the children prepare for high school education so that they can become achievers and succeed in life.

NON-FORMAL EDUCATION

AMCC faces a lot of great challenges in reaching the orphans and at-risk children. For those past school going age, AMCC provides literacy classes programs for them to learn and read. Then provides non-formal education opportunities that suits the needs of children e.g. carpentry, masonry, wielding, knitting, tailoring etc.

EDUCATING GIRLS

As the saying goes educating a girl is educating a nation, educating girls is a key aspect in the AMCC Program. Educational programs help girls learn to read, learn a trade and to make decisions for themselves.

Please if you would like to help sign up the contact information form and the response form attached here below and send it either by email or postal address to us, to help AMCC in her mission to transform the lives of orphans and at-risk children.

SECONDARY SCHOOLS

The children who endure to class eight, 90% won’t be admitted into high/secondary school due to poverty. Those who do get vacancies into form 1, about 68% drop out due to high charges of school fees.

Most of the children who endure to class eight never join secondary school due to high levies. These levies also lead to a high drop-out rate in secondary schools. In year 2007, 60,000 students who had been admitted to public secondary schools this year failed to report because their parents and guardians could not afford the fees.

The levies paid by the guardians/parents include motivation, transport and PTA charges. The motivation fee is used to pay teachers for helping their students achieve good grades in National examinations while transport fees are used to fund school trips. The PTA fees are used to pay for the activities of the Parents-Teachers Association.

The charges contribute to smooth running of schools. Head teachers resist any move to scrap them unless they are given alternatives. Other charges include levies for constructing swimming pools, buying school buses, hosting of annual general meetings and sometimes the head teachers dictate how much money parents should give their children for pocket money.

The little success, achieved through free primary education is frustrated because many of the beneficiaries cannot progress to secondary due to prohibitive school fees. It is disheartening that only 32% of children who should be in secondary school here in Kenya are benefiting from secondary education despite the governments effort to waive the tuition fees. Secondary education in Kenya is among the most expensive in the region. About 55% of family’s incomes are gobbled up by direct cost through buying uniforms and textbooks. Even the waiver by the government of tuition fees from January 2008 would have little effect because the managers are unwilling to seek ways to bring down their schools expenditures.

BIAS IN UNIVERSITY FUNDING

Due to high drop out rates and low academic i.e. performance, University education enrollment remains below 15%. Those who graduate from high school need at least an average “B” to be admitted in a university. Poor school performance by the rural children and lack of funds for education prevent many children especially the orphans, at-risk children and due to poverty from continuing their studies to universities. The average cost of a year of university in Kenya is USŁ2.069 which is out of reach for most people.

Recognizing some of the struggles faced by orphans and at-risk children in the desire for education AMCC has implemented programs to promote education by lobbying for their donor support for their education through university or vocational levels.

There is a crisis in expanding access to university education. Since 2001, the number of students admitted annually to public universities has stagnated at 10,000 despite a steady rise in the number of students qualifying with the minimum aggregate grade of C+(plus).

Only 2.9% of people who should be in university are benefiting from university education. The current university admission criteria are discriminative because it favors students from well-endowed schools.

The system of government funded students in public universities and the classification of students into regular and parallel programs is biased. The regular students are those selected by the joint Admission Board of all Public universities. They are funded by the government and have access to loans from the Higher Education Loans Board but the parallel students apply to the university as private entities, paying hundreds of thousands of Kenya shillings and have no access to loans from the Higher Education Loans Board.

Unless the government changes the admission criteria to one of the quota system whereby the government would work out the number of students it wants to sponsor from every district of who should be top performer so as to open doors for all the others who have qualified to join universities and be fully funded by the government, then university education in Kenya would remain out of reach by the majority as it is too expensive.

It is out of this realization that our mission and vision was born.