Friends of Ngong Road

Providing education and support to Nairobi children living in poverty whose families are affected by HIV/AIDS.

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COVID-19 Family Tracking Report: Summary – October 2020

Our Case Managers in Kenya have completed another round of check-in calls with our students and their families to determine how they are doing amidst the changing COVID-19 situation. If you joined one of our Annual Gatherings, you heard Kelvin report that Kenya has performed better than expected in this pandemic due to quick action and stringent enforcement of shut-down rules. For our families, here are some of the things we have learned from the most recent set of calls: 

  • Families are going back to work. 81% of our families have at least one working family member, compared to 70% of families in August.
  • 7% of students have gone back to school (all are post-secondary students), as compared to 3% of students in August.
  • About 50% of students are receiving assignments from their school. If they’re not receiving assignments from their school, we are giving them assignments to do (such as book reports). The reasons students aren’t receiving assignments can be seen in the graph below.
  • Though most families have some form of income, it is still significantly less than what they were earning before the pandemic, which was still hardly enough to support themselves. Most are reporting a continued decrease in income. You can see the percentages in the graph below.

If you are a sponsor, the individual results for your student will be posted to your portal soon, and you will receive a separate email.

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The Sponsor/Student Portal Experience

Since its inception, Friends of Ngong Road has operated with the principle of establishing one-on-one relationships between sponsors and students. Up to this point, relationships were created largely by encouraging communications, namely exchanges of letters and materials sent through the mail or hand-carried between the U.S and Kenya. This past year, the organization enhanced the ability for sponsors and students to become connected through establishing the Sponsor/Student Portal. 

While still a new tool for many to yet explore, the possibilities of how the Sponsor/Student Portal may be used still seem limitless. And especially in this time of Covid-19 imposed realities — where distance learning, social isolation, and many of us are learning to embrace technology to connect (who hasn’t joined a Zoom call?) — we thought it was a good idea to have a conversation with a sponsor and student who have pioneered its use. 

That led us to a Zoom conversation with FONR sponsor Jeri Pearcy who (along with her husband Jeff live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin) sponsor their student Perpetual in Nairobi. 

Our conversation (available in its entirety here on Illumini Podcast) resulted in a wonderful conversation, starting with how they first met in 2008 and continuing with how they have shared letters through the mail over the years. Today, both Perceptual and Jeri are coping with the pandemic. A wonderful insight was revealed, learning that they both generally shared the same attitude about living amidst the new realities of living with Covid-19, regardless of how different their living conditions. 

Conversation about the use of the Sponsor/Student Portal revealed how both Perpetual and Jeri were testing the waters with the technology, but at this point found it easy and convenient to use. They appreciated confirming the quickness of sending and receiving emails, but also are interested in sharing more photos, news articles and school assignments. Jeri is a retired nurse practitioner and teacher, and Perpetual is focused on post secondary education as a systems and business analyst.  

The discussion included ways both Jeri as a sponsor and Perpetual as a sponsored student have benefited from their connections thanks to Friends of Ngong Road.   The energy between the connection is hard to express in written form, but in conducting this Zoom session, the loving energy was virtually palatable. We hope you enjoy listening in!

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Rodney’s Story

By: Case Manager Mary Muriu

Listen to the full interview at:
https://illumini.podbean.com/

Rodney lives with his mother, brother, and nephew in the Kawangware slum of Nairobi. The family lives in a one room house made of iron sheets and timber. He joined High School this year and has been living at home since the pandemic hit and schools closed in March. His mother’s previous job was selling firewood to the slum dwellers but stopped due to a lack of buyers as many people are struggling in the slums as a result of the pandemic. In mid-June, the family was evicted due to rent arrears amounting to KES 6000 (USD $60). Their belongings were locked in the house and they had to leave everything behind with only the clothes they had on.

After they were evicted, the family went to live with a relative who lived nearby. They bought them clothes and offered them shelter as they tried to make enough money to pay what they owed for the rent.

Rodney’s mother found work washing clothes for income, but it didn’t produce much income. Yet, the little cash earned was used to offset rent arrears. Thankfully, after a month of staying with the relative, the landlord agreed to open the house and the family happily returned to their home. During this challenging time, the NRCF program provided food aid and supported Rodney with school revision materials. 

We appreciate sponsors for continued support for families like Rodney’s, and the many others that are experiencing hardship during this time. 

Mary Muriu
Senior Case Manager
Ngong Road Children’s Foundation

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COVID-19 NRCF Family Tracking Report by Michon Garrett

Listen to full interview

Friends, 

In a typical school year, case managers have lots of interactions with students where they check in about how the students are doing in school, how their families are doing at home, and about the health of the students and their families. These check-ins are part of the regular programming at Saturday Program, camp, home and school visits, meetings with families, and during school marks collection. 

However, during this pandemic, the opportunities for these check-ins have disappeared. As a result, the case managers have been calling every family about once a month to ask questions regarding updates to the family’s situation, health, and the student’s ability to do schoolwork at home. 

In May, sponsors received an update from case managers about their sponsored students and their families. Since that time, we have built a survey system in our data management system so we can collect and analyze the information we receive, and so we can publish it to sponsors more easily. This data collection allows us to see trends in what is happening to the families in the program, and identify situations where we can help make things easier. Below is some of the summarized data.
 

Information ReportedNumber of responses
out of 365		Total percentage
No one in the household is working5414.79%
Reported decrease in household income30784.11%
At high risk for eviction4813.15%
Receiving and doing assignments at home18751.23%
Student doesn’t have necessary technology to complete assignments277.40%

We have published the information collected by the case managers about your student to your sponsor portal so you can learn about how your student and family is managing in the midst of the pandemic. In addition, we will be sending the results to your email, so keep an eye out for it this afternoon.

If you are not yet a sponsor and are interested in sponsoring a student, please visit us at www.ngongroad.org/sponsor. 

Michon Garrett
Information Systems and Business Manager
Friends of Ngong Road

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School closings, COVID-19, Program Update, and more from Kelvin Thuku

Greetings Friends, 

I hope you are all keeping safe during these trying times. At NRCF here in Nairobi we are keeping safe and continue to support our families and students through the Food From Friends program and regular follow up calls by case managers. The 2020 school calendar year has been confirmed to be a lost academic year with schools expected to resume in 2021. This means our students will continue staying home for a longer period than anticipated. 

For primary students, the schools have a program to keep students engaged during this period; they will receive assessments every month which they are required to submit to the school for marking. The case managers will be following up with students to ensure they are able to study from home. For high school students, the schools will continue sending assignments to students to keep them engaged. Finally, for post-secondary, the government has directed that the educational institution can have phased resumption in September while observing safety measures. The priority is to give final year students the ability to resume physically and for all other students, institutions are encouraged to adopt online learning. NRCF is working on strategies to support students for online learning when they resume through a computer loaner program and computer lab access scheduling.

In addition to education, NRCF is planning to restart special programs in August with the approval of local authorities and if the ban on gathering is lifted to help keep students engaged during this period. Sexual reproductive health program will start in August where youth peer providers will start facilitating small group sessions to help students make informed choices and stay safe from teenage pregnancies. Life skill sessions will start in September to acquaint students with necessary skills needed to survive such a difficult time. 

The Food From Friends program has been running smoothly; we continue to serve approximately 300 families every month with over 500 packages of food. We plan to continue with food issuance through to the end of the year.

Thank you for your continued support and commitment to supporting the students’ through the crisis with the hope of getting to an end of the crisis and refocusing on the mission of transforming their lives.

Regards

Kelvin Thuku
Programme Manager
Ngong Road Children’s Foundation