A Visit To A Girl Power Club: St. Catherine School, Kibera

Girl Power Club - St. Catherine School in Kibera is very special: learn about the effort and sacrifice of two people who chose to change the lives of many in the founders of this school.

St Catherine School was founded in the year 2000 by Pastor James Anyango and his wife Cprine. It started as an orphanage;   a large number of children had no home to stay in the society. It started with three children who had lost their parents and no relative of them was willing to take them in, further orphans who had lost their parents due to poverty aids or violence were adopted .The number gradually increased  step by step developed to a preschool then a primary school was created. More than 150 children are learning in the school some from the orphanage and others from the west side of kibera slum. The orphanage has more than 30 children currently as some are leaving .Its main objective is to help the needy children in kibera to achieve a better life and give them the right perspective for the future to reach their life time goals.

In the year 2015 a road construction project has been implemented in kibera slum by the ministry of devolution to reduce crime activities in the slum, hygienic purpose and to better their living in kibera. The process has really affected the school since they had to give way for the project. The school has split into two a preschool [from baby class to class three] and upper primary [from class four to class eight]. It has been left with no field or playing ground. Girls dormitory for the orphanage were also affected during the contraction .This courses congestion since the kids have to share the left rooms.

The heavy load of construction and organizing the school has been left on teachers and the children. The distance also from the children’s home to the school has been added with almost 1.5 km since that is the distance the school has been forced to split and migrate from its original position. Water and food has become a challenge too .Children prepare their own lunch in  turns, using the kitchen which is shared between the school and the children’s home, so as to save on time. The road also is a problem. The school has no fencing or enough space for the children and during the tea break time they run to the road to play or find something to eat which is dangerous due to the high speeding cars and motorcycle.  It has two toilets which are in a poor and dangerous condition and this has led to poor sanitation. The school assemblies have also been affected making it hard to communicate to children as one. Classes are filled with dust, cracked walls and poor roofing which allow sun and rain to penetrate easily to the classes.

 The school and orphanage depends on its farm at Migori County in Kenya, the church, donation of items and fund, child sponsorship, cooperative company and volunteers to enable them get funds for running the school.