Helping children in the Kibera slums
Kibera is the largest urban slum in Africa. With no running water, little electricity and open sewers running throughout the community, Kibera can be a tough place to grow up. The risk of being attacked by the many gangs who control the area, the lack of any meaningful employment and the poor educational opportunities make it tougher still.
Kings Rugby Development Academy (KRDA) and The Lunchbowl Network are on a mission to change this. Working exclusively with Kiberian children, KRDA are providing children between the ages of 5-19 an opportunity to access, train, and participate in rugby as a means of providing sport and education for a better future. The programme also provides fresh drinking water, hot showers, and regular health check-ups, as well as nutritious meals and learning materials. The Lunchbowl Network then offers these same children a high-quality education via their kindergarten and primary school, ensuring they have more and better choices as they grow up.
The KRDA has also recently established a Homework Hub, which runs every school day and Saturday mornings. This has significantly improved exam grades.
Overview
| Categories | Beneficiaries |
| – Rugby training and coaching sessions – Education/ Homework hub – afterschool club – Workshops and life skills training – Rugby festivals and tournaments | – 300+ children from the Kibera and local schools |
Situation
There is an incredibly high number of children who are orphaned and extremely vulnerable currently living in the Kibera – the largest slum in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Children do not have access to clean water and regular meals. Going to school is impossible for many young people in the Kibera. The absolute lack of money, through no fault of their own, means that they cannot ever leave the Kibera or attend school. They miss out on the essential benefits schooling provides. This limits their capacity and future.
Solution
The most vulnerable children are collected and transported out of the Kibera each Sunday and taken to the RFUEA grounds to play rugby. The programme is interested in giving the children from the Kibera green fields of open space, positive ‘coach’ role models, nutritious food, plenty of clean water to drink, medical support and the joy of exchanging rags for rugby kits and much more. They have the opportunity to develop and gain some of the life skills that will give them a track out of poverty.
Testimonials
Getrude Ambeyi’s Story
Last year, a group of trekkers from the Atlas Foundation led by Jason Leonard, OBE, visited us. They did numerous house visits and one of the homes visited was for Gertrude Ambeyi, a then 17 year old girl who was out of school due to lack of school fees. The group immediately resorted to helping her go back to school and finish her high school study. We got her a nice boarding school (Kiambu Elite High School) which she joined this year and is now thriving playing rugby as well as her studies. Sadly, this year Gertrude lost her mother who she was living with. The Atlas team will continue paying her fees in 2024.
Aims
- The principal aim is to uplift the youth of Kibera out of hopeless poverty. To provide them with the opportunity to see their individual worth and fulfil their potential.
- To grow the programme to impact over 1000 children and encourage more children to play rugby.
- To provide healthy role models via positive coaching and peer relationships and provide another alternative for the youth, one that helps them avoid the desperate descent into antisocial behaviour.
- Provide educational support and access to scholarships at local schools.
- To connect each child with a rugby family for their personal needs, food, education, healthcare and other basic needs.
How we use your donations
Your donations are used for the following:
- Transporting costs
- Meals and clean water for roughly 300 kids
- Coaches’ allowances, provision of kit, boots and trainers
- Rugby equipment, including balls, cones and first aid kits etc
Impact and achievements
The KRDA uses rugby as a tool to drive change. To this effect, we have partnered with a couple of secondary schools that will be giving rugby scholarships to our boys and girls after completing their primary education.
- Providing weekly supervised training sessions for children ages 5-19 years reaching up to 300 children each session.
- Providing up to 300 children with a hot weekly nutritious meal each week
- Our children have been sponsored by the Lunchbowl Network to attend the ACK Good Samaritan & Lunchbowl Network Partnership local primary school.
- Sourced rugby kits, including boots (150 provided by the Atlas Foundation) and trainers for 250 children.
- Delivering a quarterly deworming programme, improving the vitality of the children. This is a significant factor in combatting stunted growth and poor mental development.
- Creating a healthy competition in the children who took part in several tournaments