February News

SECONDARY SCHOOL OPENED

Mwangaza Community Development Group has opened a secondary school at St. Peter! Five new students have joined the first class and the lessons have officially started on 13th of February. More new students are expected to join in this week.

One of the primary reasons for opening the school has been the crisis in the Kenyan education system. Many students had failed their final tests and committed suicides. (http://kenyauptodate.blogspot.com/2012/01/another-pupil-commits-suicide.html)

In the Kenyan system, all the students who finish primary education are taking the same final exam and if they score less than 250, they are limited to continue their studies. Many secondary schools have an access limits of 350 and above. Also the secondary school fees are often too high for students who come from low income background to afford.

Thus Mwangaza has opened a new secondary to target the vulnerable and needy youth in the community who otherwise have no access to secondary school. We admit all pupils with any marks they have and we have set very low course fees:

Admission fee: 800

Course fee per term: 3,000 KSH

Caution fees: 150 per term (for extra curricular activities)

TEACH MORE SKILLS and PRACTICAL KNOWLEDGE!

We target to grow our school to be a full primary and secondary school, which teaches skills and nurtures talents individually making every student perfect in his or her potential.

Recently, there have been some cases of student suicides in Kenya after their exam results were released. The school exam failure is causing a lot of grief to many pupils and their families and the reason is that the current schools only educate the children with academic knowledge of how to pass an exam and not with education that is practical for life. Children are not educated to be strong and independent, innovative or wise in terms of skills. Children and youths are lacking artistic expression, innovative minds and physical fitness.

We want to change theoretical chemistry to be practical in which children learn for instance to make soap practically, theoretical mathematics to become practical business related mathematics etc.

The main goal of Mwangaza Group is to offer quality education to all children. It is vital to empower and educate vulnerable children many of whom have no parents or come from low income families and cannot afford education. All children deserve the same quality education no matter how rich their parents are and we are fighting for the equality to be established in the educational system. The more children we empower, the more successful our project will be.