School provides a safe haven for girls

Imagine walking several kilometres every day to attend school in an area inhabited by all kinds of wild animals. To this, add a culture that hardly encourages education, especially for the girl-child.

That is the life of pupils from Emurutoto Primary School in Kawai in the heart of the Maasai Mara and many other parts of Maasailand.

The girls in the Maasai community often have to worry about being married off, thus interrupting their education. Thankfully, the girls in Emurutoto now have a chance to concentrate on nothing else but education.

This is after a dormitory in the school was officially opened by Angels in Africa, a non-governmental organisation that has been working with the school and the community which lives to the west of the Mara conservancy.

The dorm, with a modern architectural design, will house 200 girls from Standard Four to Eight.

"The girls will be provided with everything, including bedding, towels as well as sanitary towels. All they need to do is concentrate on their studies," said the headteacher, Simon Masake.

The small school with just eight classrooms serving the whole school will now serve as a safe haven for the girls who are a vulnerable group in the area.

"Very few girls have finished school in this area because they are often pulled out of school to be married off by their families," said Masake, adding that with the school having turned into a boarding school for girls, it would keep the girls safe from early marriages and female genital mutilation.

His sentiment was echoed by Janet Martin, the Angels in Africa director and the force behind the dormitory in the remote school.

"I first came to Maasai Mara over 25 years ago and I made friends with a lady called Milkah who went to school here. One of the things I noticed was that the women and girls in this region were a vulnerable group and it is for this reason that we decided to build the girls dormitory first," she said.

Martin said that though Angels in Africa had built the dorm and a modern dining hall with a kitchen fitted with equipment, the idea came from the school and the community.

"Most NGOs tend to impose their ideas on the communities they work in but we went to the school and the community to ask how they wanted to us to help. They first suggested the dining hall because the students used to eat under trees and for some, it would be the only meal for the day. Then they asked for a dormitory to house the girls," Martin said.

Each room in the dormitory, which cost $400 000 (about Sh34 million) will house eight girls in four bunk beds.

The dormitory includes an infirmary as well as a lawn right in the middle of the structure where the girls can relax after classes.

The dormitory, dubbed Naratisho, is named after Martin, who was given the name Naratisho by the Maasai community.

Angels in Africa made has also fenced the school with an electric fence to keep out wild animals given the school is part of the park.

Though the area does not have electricity, a generator has been installed to ensure the girls have a little extra time to study in the evening. The school administration says it is pushing to have electricity installed.

The school's headteacher pointed out that together with Angels in Africa, they had started a sensitisation campaign to educate the parents on the importance of allowing their children - both boys and girls - to go to school.

"We have seen a great improvement in the school in terms of attendance and performance since Angels in Africa came in. In the 2014 Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examinations, we had more girls than boys. We had 23 girls and 20 boys sit for the examinations. The overall ratio of the boys to girls in the school is not bad either because we have 243 boys and 235 girls," said Masake.

With the girl-child being given attention and being empowered to make sure she is ready to face the world, some have started to argue that the boy-child is being forgotten and left to fend for himself.
The boys of Emurutoto, however, do not need to worry.

"Our next project will be to build a dormitory for the boys to make sure they have the same opportunities to concentrate on their studies as the girls. We will also build more classes," Martin said.

Naseria Kamet, a resident of Kawai and a parent at Emurutoto Primary School, could not hide her joy because of the opportunities her daughter now has after the opening of the dorm.

"It almost makes me want to go back to school. I wish this had happened in our days. We now know the importance of taking our children to school and the girls have all the time to concentrate on their studies instead of getting married," she said.

During the 2014 KCPE examinations, about five girls were already engaged to be married off.

"A father coming to pull his daughter from school for marriage is not strange here; usually we try to convince the father to let the child stay in school. We also alert the area chief about the matter and the father is issued with a warning," said Masake.

The students of Emurutoto who manage to score 250 marks and above in KCPE join secondary schools and university under the full sponsorship of Angels in Africa.

"The first girl we ever sponsored is studying medicine at Kenyatta University. We intend to continue sponsoring the student," said Martin.

Apart from the development on the school, Angels in Africa started an enterprise activity for the women of Kamai where they run a poultry farm and a beehive project.