Kenya, Seje Community Development and Long-term Plans

Sept 2013

Present RealitiesSeje, a rural community made up of 5 smaller villages and a total population of about 5,000 people, is located 30 minutes from Siaya town in the Siaya district. Bar Olengo is one of the sub district of Seje and has a current human population of 2,945.The community has struggled to end the cycle of poverty that has been created by multiple factors, including a lack education, health, agriculture, and economical advancement. Since 2007, a combination of North American churches and local community members have focused their efforts on the education needs and have built six school buildings for 176 students ranging from K to grade 7. The school compound also now has access to a clean source of water in addition to a soccer field. The local Gospel Power church building has been renovated to be used as a church and school building.

Country FactsCountry: Kenya

Population: 41 million (2011 est.)

Area: 560,367 km2 (compared to Canada at 9,984,870 km2)

Capital: Nairobi

Languages: English (official) and Swahili (official)

Partner MinistryGospel Power World Church

Under the umbrella of the Gospel Power World Church, Bishop Richard Ogol oversees 45 churches in the East Africa region. HFL has partnered with Biship Ogol since 2007 in the Western Kenyan communities of Siaya, Seje, Kisumu and Boro. Richard does church planting and evangelism, which is his calling in ministry. He is currently waiting upon the Lord to show him a ministry that he can work hand-in-hand with to provide education and biblical-view studies to his pastors and other leaders.Richard is married to Everlyn and has five children. Willis Odhiambo, the eldest son, is in University doing his second year Degree in Computer Science. His eldest daughter Beryl is also doing her nursing course at the University of Nursing in central province. Mark, his third born, has just come home and is in Nairobi Secondary School. His daughter Naomi, who is 2 1/2 will be joining School next year as the Lord provides. Of the youngest, Eldon David, he says “That is our last child. Five is okay for now. No more, that is my prayer.”Richard depends upon the Lord for his family and loves to see God do wonders through friends as he promotes the Gospel through his work with churches.

EducationOne of the strategies to enable the school to become self-sustaining was to transition the school from being private to becoming a government registered school. Once the process has been completed the operational expenses of the school will be provided by the ministry of education. Seje school is currently in the process of being registered. Children used to grow up not knowing what school was because it was not available and now the community of Seje, and more specifically in the Bar Olengo sub district has worked hard to provide an education for their children. The school compound, had been a forest was cleared by the community. Teachers have been providing free labor to teach, and other community members have made desks for the students and funds have been raised to build classrooms one step at a time. Children are being provided an education however, comparing them to national standards a grade 7 student is actually only at a grade 3 level.

Immediate Needs:

Latrines: In order to comply with the department of public health the school needs to add 2 additional latrines with 4 doors each.

Classroom Repair: 3 of the current classrooms require the floors to be repaired as part of the requirement from the ministry of education.

Painting School: The ministry of education requires the school to be painted the same as the school uniforms. 3 classrooms require painting.

Educational Material: Providing school academic material to the grade 1 to 8 classes.

Employing a teachers service commission (TSC): A TSC plays the role of employing new government funded teachers. This is a temporary cost as the government will fund the TSC once transition is complete.

OpportunitiesThere are many opportunities for change to occur. The following are the initial and long-term stages of what it will take to bring about community transformation while working alongside the people of Seje. Many need to follow each other in successive order while others may occur simultaneously.

•Education •Micro Finance Loans•Water & Sanitation•Health Initiatives

•VBS Programs•Pastoral Training•Vocational Training•Construction Projects

•Agricultural Training Programs

•Life-skill Training

Plan of Action

Education Cont’d

Long Term Needs:

Classroom Construction: Constructing 2 additional classroom for grade 8 students.

Technical Institute: Utilizing the newly constructed church building on the school property will be used to provide students who cannot afford to further their education in secondary school. The technical school will provide training in dressmaking, tailoring, computers, and welding in hope of providing a useful skill to generate income. This project relies on having power provided at the school which it currently does not have. Enrolled students will provide a small fee to pay for the cost of the trainers.

Scholarship Fund: Providing resources to cover school fees which will to enable top students to continue in their education at the secondary level.

Health

Some of the major concerns identified by the community are inadequate access to health services due to distance to and from health facilities, inaccessible roads, few health facilities spread out too far within area, inadequacy of information, no access to clean drinking water until recently, poor nutrition/malnutrition, and low income cash for accessing health facilities. The distance to the nearest health center is a 45 minute walk away while the next referral health facility is an 1 hour and 15 minutes walk away. Distance and shortage of financial resources makes it very difficult for any resident of Seje to be treated. The most common health complications in the community are: malaria, typhoid, diarrhea, and water borne diseases, followed by respiratory infections and jiggers.

Health Care Workers: Training community health care workers is a strategy developed to provide basic health care within the rural communities. Trainees will also be supplied with health care kits complete with medication and health care extension services to reach more people with medication. 40 people will be targeted for the training which will take place over a 5 day period. The ministry of education has begun plans and policies to provide community health workers with the supplies needed to continue health care programs by the year 2015.

Bicycles: Purchasing 40 bicycles for the community health care workers to expand the amount of people being assisted in and around the sub location.

Laboratory: Constructing a laboratory at Bar Olengo Dispensary to provide medical test services to the community.

Health Days: Providing on a quarterly basis a team of local medical professionals to address vaccination, immunization, drugs for jiggers, and other health needs. This will target 400 to 500 individuals every quarter.

NOTE: Purified drinking water has been provided at the school compound through a in addition to two more water points in the community. Water Missions International, the implementing organization have stayed closely involved requesting that until August 2013 that they monitor and evaluate the project. At this time they will increase the production of the water pump which will double the amount of clean water points available in the community.

EconomyLow food production and irregular rainfall have largely contributed to the poverty situation in Seje putting the community below the national average of. Of the rural assesment participants, 30% desired to practice small scale business if they received the initial capital to carry out income generating activities.

Agriculture Project: A majority of people in the community depend on agriculture production for their source of food. Utilizing 6 acres with an irrigation system to produce maize, tomatoes, and watermelons to use and sell in the market will enable the community garden to provide for itself in addition to providing food for the school children. The goal is to develop a self-sustaining garden with the community providing the labor on a rotational basis so that their children can be provided a meal at school. Budget also includes the operational cost of the first 4 months.

Women’s Co Op Project: Selecting 10 groups made of 25 women each for a small scale income generating project that involved table banking and small business enterprises like cereal vending. Table-banking refers to small-scale financial transactions usually done on a very informal basis, often in one of the participants home. Such table-banking can be a major help among the poor who find credit difficult to obtain from banking institutions and who need an initial capital input in order to start their income generation project. Purchasing cereal crops during harvest time at a reasonable price and then re selling them at a time when they are not being produced to yield larger returns. Project costs consist of training and initial seed money for each group.

Dairy Goat Project: Identifying a group of 10 people within the community to be trained on dairy goat farming. The program would include the provision of 2 dairy goats and 1 buck per group. The group would be required to open a savings account for the future sale of the milk. Each year the newborn goats from the flock are given to new groups to extend the program. Community members who are not part of the group will be encouraged to upgrade their local breeds through the use of the bucks at a small fee. The project will consist of 20 dairy female goats with calf, 10 bucks, 10 structures for animals, training, acaricides, and deworming medication.

Electricity: Bringing electricity to the Seje school compound.

Project BenefitsEducation:Latrines: By complying with the department of public health in providing the required pit latrines will decrease the current health risks of the students in addition to furthering the process of registering the school with the ministry of education.

Classroom Repair: Some of the floors have increasingly been getting worse with the high amount of student use. Repairing the floors will ensure that jiggers will not become an issue in addition to furthering the process of registering the school with the ministry of education.

Painting School: Along with coming under compliance with the ministry of education, painting the school will provide students a much more vibrant environment to learn then the currently grey buildings.

Educational Material: Seje school currently lacks any educational books for academic lessons for grade 6 and 7 students. With the provision of academic materials students will no longer be hindered in their learning.

Education:

Employing a TSC: In order to prepare for the transition of operating the school from private to government, the temporary hiring of a teachers service commission (TSC) plays the role of employing new government funded teachers. The community is currently employing 4 untrained teachers and 1 headmaster for 176 students. Once the government has transitioned to take over the school they will provide between 8 to 12 trained teachers which will increase the students’ academic scores.

Classroom Construction: The school is currently providing education from K to grade 7 and need additional classrooms to provide room for grade 8 students.

Technical Institute: The nearest technical school is located 40 minutes away by car. Many of the students resort to drinking and females become pregnant at an early age causing economical pressure on the family/community. We want to provide this program to alleviate some of the above issues and provide an opportunity for students who are unable to attend secondary school a skill they can use to generate income for themselves and their families.

Scholarship Fund: Providing incentive to study for students we will select as many top students as funds allow to provide them with a scholarship to continue their post primary education. Having the government run the school will lessen the economic burden of the community to provide operational support for the school in addition to providing a better education for the students.

Health:Health Care Worker Training: Due to the distance and cost in other medical facilities, equipping 40 community health workers will help in decreasing the amount of illness/diseases within the community. This will decrease the amount of time lost going to school or working for individuals in the community in addition to raising the quality of life for 5,000 people. Community health workers will also be arranging for pregnant mothers to give birth at the nearest government health facility with the financial assistance of the ministry of health.

Bicycles: Will provide equip community health workers to see and treat patients quicker than if by foot. This will also increase their ability to treat those outside of the community to 9,000 people.

Laboratory: Once constructed the laboratory will provide the community the benefit of lab services which is currently a 45 minute walk one way. This will decrease the amount of time it takes to diagnose an illness so the money can be used get treated at the district hospital. Government policy required HIV positive individuals to be first tested at a lab before they can receive free treatment which will address the large issue of people not being tested which has resulted in a lot of pre mature deaths.

Health Days: Addressing areas of need specific to vaccinations, immunizations, and other emerging health needs will have a positive economic and educational impact on the community in addition to raising the quality of life.

Economy:Agriculture Project: Children currently have to travel home during lunch time which results lost time at school and lost time for mom’s trying to manage the household. Making sure each child is being fed at school will ensure they are eating at least 1 nutritional meal a day which will result in better scores in addition to lightening the financial burden of the family.

Womens Co Op Program: This will be a pilot project to see how much of a return the womens group will be able to make with the specific cereal crops that have been chosen. The intention is to enable what the group financially saves to grow into larger profits. The project will empower the women in procuring government tenders once the have seed money. Through the co-operative society these groups will be able to access both grants and loans from the government.

Dairy Goat Project: This will become a sustainable source of revenue for the selected 10 groups which will also begin to begin to benefit the community annually with the gift of providing a newborn goat to those outside the group.

Electricity: In order to run the technical institute, a consistent power source is required. This will enable the sewing machines, computers, and welding machine to be utilized for training.

Material AidThere are many opportunities to fulfill a need in the community such as:

•Clothing and shoes - Always a need for children and adults to be provided with quality clothing.

•Hygiene Supplies – the provision of soap, toothbrushes and toothpaste along with education is always a need.

•Sanitary Pads – provision of reusable sanitary pads for female students will enable them to not miss up to a week each month of school.

Annual Activities In addition to the proposed activities, it would be beneficial to provide smaller initiatives to help battle malnutrition, educate children and inject small amounts of capital into the local economy.

•Church Social Activities – Provide meals as outreach events to bring people to the church so that they can hear the Gospel message as well as bring children from the community together to socialize.

•Pastoral Training – Many of the Pastors and key church leaders in this area do not have official training and would love the opportunity to be discipled and would benefit from biblical training.

•VBS Programs – Organizing and hosting biblical-based day-camps for kids in the church and community to attend.

•Food Distribution – Have a food distribution where those in most need within the community would receive a bag of grocery staples.

•Home Renovations – Selecting those most in need to renovate homes, providing them with a safe place to live from the elements.

Facilitated by Hungry For Life International