Click here to watch a TED Talk by Margo McAuliffe, Kenya Help’s founder, and learn how we got started!
Click here to watch a video in which Margo receives a local hero award.
- Situated midway between Nairobi and Nakuru, Naivasha is a fast-growing town, and there is not enough space in the high schools to serve the number of teenagers there. The parish-run high school, Archbishop Ndingi, served both boys and girls up to 2006. The parish had received land for a girls’ school but there were no funds to build it. Margo McAuliffe, a retired math teacher, arrived to teach students at Archbishop Ndingi School in 2005 and learned about the limited educational opportunities for girls. Upon returning home, she founded Kenya Help to raise money to build a high school for them. Needs work: Manos Unidos funded science labs. Parish may have contributed the desks.
- Enough of the school was completed by 2007 for the first class of Form 1s (9th graders) to enter. There were 17 girls. Eventually the school grew to 8 classrooms, 2 science labs, a computer lab(?), library, infirmary, teacher and administrative offices, 2 dormitories, dining/social hall, kitchen, and faculty/staff housing. The school can accommodate 320 students and is open to girls of all tribal and religious affiliations. This school gives hope to young women, many of whom have no other opportunities for education, to better their lives and the lives of their families.
- From the beginning, St Francis was built with the vision to be a completely green school. It is equipped with solar panels, 2 windmills, and a biogas plant is currently being installed. The school also has a de-fluoridation plant to take the excess fluorine, which occurs naturally in Naivasha, out of the drinking water. An agriculture teacher teaches agriculture. (Need more information).
- Since the building of St Francis Xavier School is now complete, the focus of Kenya Help has shifted to raising money for scholarships for needy and deserving students.
