Other school visits
In the course of conducting the site visit to Horseed Primary School, the team visited several other schools and governmental offices. Following is a summary of the key points from these visits.
Kakuma County Sub Office. Ms Cecilia Akitela, Principal Education Officer for Turkana West district, Ministry of Education.
Ms Akitela explained there are currently 63 primary schools and 8 secondary schools serving Kakuma. The schools face a number of problems among them:
- Infrastructure (shortage of classrooms, latrine sanitation, safe water, security fences).
- Basic female needs for girls
- Shortage of qualified teaching and support staff
- Tuition for students to continue in secondary school. Secondary school is not free and many families chose to send boys instead of qualified girls on to secondary. This is important as school attendance greatly reduces the instance of early marriage of girls, and coincides with reduction of FGM (female genital mutilation) as well.
Another urgent situation that is developing is the numbers of very young children working or begging in and around the Kakuma refugee camp. These are children from the host community whose families cannot take care of them, or who actively encourage them because of the extreme poverty they face. Their traditional way of life as herders is increasingly disappearing due to the recurrent drought and with no economic alternatives available many very young children as young as five are forced to beg or work, or worse.
She mentioned the Nadivknyen (sp) Centre in Lodwar as working in this area. The UNHCR Education Assistant, Evelyn Lobar has volunteered to provide details and whatever figures they have on the number of children in this situation.
We need to know the numbers and carefully consider what form assistance should take, considering many children still have families. Child labour and begging becomes a source of economic support to these families and must be approached with a much understanding on our part.
This would be an excellent next project. It is ironic that members of the host community are suffering to the extent they are turning to the refugee community for help. It also takes into account the afore mentioned need to help both the host community and the refugee community.
Nationkar Primary School
The Headteacher explained there are currently 1320 students, or learners as they like to say from nine different nationalities. There are 766 boys and 554 girls.
- A noteworthy feature of this school is that has 80% refugee and 20% host community students. It receives partial support from the Kenyan MOE (Ministry of Education).
- The 17 member BOM is balanced, consisting of members of the refugee camp as well as members of the host community.
- Another notable feature is they board students as well: 245 boys and 76 girls for a total of 321. We were not able to get a precise breakdown but some of the children being boarded are from the host community.
- They have two large UNICEF tents currently being used as classrooms and a shortage of latrines.
Given the large number of host community students enrolled in the school, this would be a good location for a project similar to that currently underway in Horseed. Two standard classrooms with secure rooms for IT and book storage. The construction of one classroom was started sometime in the past but looks abandoned now.
In addition, any assistance to the boarding sector of the school would be beneficial to refugee and host community.
Future Primary School
Founded in 2018 with 3600 learners this primary school has grown rapidly to its current enrolment of 3,496 boys and 2,754 girls for a total of 6,250. A relatively small portion of them are from the host community, 30 boys and 15 girls.
It is a UNHCR and UNICEF sponsored school and receives no assistance from the Kenyan MOE.
The school has a number of temporary construction classrooms but has no tents. The kitchen facilities and food storage area are quite new and of a far better standard than for example those in Horseed.
The Headteacher stressed the need for separate classrooms and play area for the growing numbers of pre-school learners.
Kakuma Arid Zone Primary School
There are 1,269 learners with 758 boys and 511 girls. It has a large boarding population of 780: 420 boys and 360 girls. It is sponsored by the Kenyan MOE, the Headteacher explained that the government funding was quite inadequate for desks and other classroom needs.
We visited a classroom that has been converted to a secure room for the newly distributed tablets and other IT equipment. It is simply a permanent constructed room (solid block and concrete walls) a solid locking door and windows, and newly installed charging outlets for charging the tablets. It has a number of tables and chairs so students can remain in the secure room but do not have to sit on the floor.
This was an adequate and much cheaper solution than a separate safe room with a large locking steel cabinet and complicated electrical outlets and circuit breakers that we saw in a well-funded private boarding school.
The Headteacher emphasized that all schools in Kakuma, and in Kenya for that matter lack adequate desks. The small amount of funding marked for that purpose usually gets used for basic infrastructure like classrooms. We saw this in most schools, where the younger learners usually sit on the floor. He said the most helpful thing for his school would be if each student had a desk and a tablet. This inspired us to think of a possible future project, or program.
A desk and a tablet: Based on the experience in Arid Zone Primary, we estimate that a new desk, produced locally would cost about US$ 60. A new tablet as supplied by the Kenyan MOE costs approximately US$ 150. Taking into account logistics and incidentals it should be able to provide a desk and tablet for US$ 200. It may be less as the desks are usually for two or three students and I’m not sure if that is being taken into account. Also, there may well be a discount for bulk orders.
This could be an excellent project undertaken in cooperation with other NGO’s or even a program for UNA.