Valvisions’ Scholars Prepare for the Teachers Service Commission
May 13, 2019
Two of the Valvisions Scholars arrived today from Pokot. They will be here for the next 3 months as they sit for their final exams and attend teaching practice in the neighborhood schools. Though they have been attending teaching practice in their local primary school, they need to be assessed by the teachers from Thogoto College as part of the exam’s requirements.
The third Valvisions Scholar will, however, not be coming, as she has already completed her exams. The results for her will be out in June. Once the girls get their timetable tomorrow, we will be able to plan for them to attend the Club meeting at Shiners and give a talk to the entire school as earlier planned.
We had very good conversations with the girls over dinner; they have really matured, and they see life differently than they did before. They realize they are now adults and soon will be leaving home for jobs with the Teachers Service Commission. They are happy to finish school and thankful that they have had help all the way from secondary school to college. They feel sorry for their peers who did not get a college education because of one challenge or the other. They realize the need to lift each other up and are very grateful they have stuck together and encouraged each other along the way. There is still drought in their home. Though most of Kenya has received some rainfall, Pokot has not had a single drop of rain.
The Choice Club activities are going along well. Last week we were able to attend meetings with all the 4 schools in our Choice Club program. The girls in the various schools have resumed school though a few have not reported back due to tuition fee challenges.
We had a lengthy talk with the Director of Njabini Girls; he was commending us on helping mentor the girls at his school. He agrees that the school authorities have had a lot of challenges with the girl’s attitude which has adversely affected their performance. The girls were originally scoring good grades, but eventually began to fail. He believes with a renewed change of attitude, which the school authorities have started seeing since we joined them, the grades will begin to rise, once again. Today we started the week at AIC Ngong where we covered hygiene issues. Tomorrow we are in Kimuka and Thursday Njabini Girls.
The Choice Clubs are active in the four schools shown here:
Buying bicycles for the girls, helps keep them in school. Having a bicycle to ride, oddly helps reduce pregnancies. Most schoolgirls get free rides to school by motorbike riders, and they end up engaging in affairs that are not right. Most get pregnant and drop out of school. This initiative by PLAN International is helping the girls keep away from such vices.
