Helping hand raises slum children's prospects

Long way to go

According to UNICEF, despite the substantial progress that has been made in Africa in terms of access, quality and completion of basic education, disparities persist for children from the poorest backgrounds, children with disabilities and those who are forced to move.

In 2019, when the World Bank introduced the concept of "learning poverty" as the inability to read and understand simple text by the age of 10, it was discovered that 87 percent of children in sub-Saharan Africa are "learning poor", and the bulk of these children come from slum areas or informal settlements.

Due to a lack of government-funded schools, many informal schools have sprung up in the majority of informal settlements across Africa. UNICEF says informal schools in African slums not only facilitate access to education, but also offer a safe space for young people. Many of these schools also offer basic services and amenities such as meals and toilets, which are not available in slums.

In 2001, then known only as MCEDO, the school opened with the simple premise of offering a basic education and safe spaces for children. It only had three classrooms.

The original school bordered the police shooting range and students and teachers could hear gunshots ringing out when police officers did their shooting practice, said Gladys Achieng Oginga, MCEDO's head teacher who joined the school in 2009.

However, what began as a simple education project more than 20 years ago has grown in leaps and bounds and today the school can boast of giving thousands of slum children an education.

The approach to the school premises is a single-lane tarmac road that snakes through a sea of tin shacks that seem to stretch to the horizon. To the right of the road, the waters of the Mathare River carry a steady flow of garbage discarded by the slum residents who have nowhere else to dispose of their waste.

The two-story school buildings stand out as some of the few solid structures in the vicinity. Beside the school is a dirt field where the students play during their breaks. The field also doubles as a soccer pitch for the local community after school hours finish.

Head teacher Oginga is a living testament of how an education can transform a slum child's life. She grew up in Mathare slum but was lucky to get a basic education, study at college and become a teacher. With her knowledge of the challenges facing slum children, she decided to pay her community back by taking a teaching job at the school.

"I am lucky my parents understood the importance of education and sent me to school because most of my peers did not get an education and cannot get gainful employment," Oginga said.

"I decided to come back and teach at MCEDO Beijing School because I know how instrumental education is in transforming the slum, and I wanted to make a difference in my own community," she said.

Benedict Kiage, the school's director and longest-serving member of staff, said one of the early aims of the school was to keep Mathare slum children in class.

"When we started MCEDO School back in 2001, education was an issue in Mathare, children were not going to school and a large number of people were illiterate. This need to see children in the slum acquire basic education is what motivated us to set up the school," Kiage said.

Despite their good intentions the school founders were faced with financial hardships and found it difficult to maintain school operations. Kiage said luck smiled on them in 2007 when they were introduced to officials from the Chinese embassy in Kenya, leading to a partnership of growth, collaboration and mutual exchanges.