Karibu to K.K. Ndege and Marinya Primary Schools!

By Danaiet Teame, Gloria Smith and Danielle McConnell

We started off the week on the right foot as we presented to the staff of the hospital on the prevention of pressure ulcers. Our presentation went well and was well received by the staff and we were asked many questions about the information by the staff throughout the following days at the hospital. We really enjoyed presenting and are looking forward to the next opportunity we will have to present.
Wednesday was another amazing day as we visited two of the new FHF supported schools: Kieni-Kia-Ndege (KK Ndege) and Marinya-a-Rubi. At both schools we taught the students about malaria, the use of malaria nets, and we talked to the girls in the upper grades about menstruation. We gave out a total of 420 Insecticide-treated Malaria nets and 68 reusable sanitary pads. The Malaria nets and sanitary pads were purchased with donations from FHF as well as the generous donations from Gloria’s church, Winsloe United.
We were greeted at KK Ndege School by the schools twinning teacher, Dorcas Mutuma. She organized the students who came to greet us on the soccer pitch, sitting in neat rows by standard. We started off each presentation by asking the students to raise their hands if they had ever been sick with malaria. Almost every student raised his or her hand. We were shocked! We were also shocked when we asked the students how they might contract malaria and they answered “by the female Anopheles mosquito.” We were hoping they would say “mosquito” but never expected such specificity. We demonstrated to each class how to use the nets by getting volunteers from the classes. The students really liked this part and this is where we got to ask them questions to make sure they were learning. After the malaria teaching, we sat in a circle with the older girls and had a “girl talk.” This was challenging with the combination of it being a sensitive topic at that age and with the communication barrier. The girls were very pleased with their reusable pads and had a lot of questions. We ended our time at KK by handing out the soccer jerseys that the Van Leeuwens donated and running around the soccer pitch with the kids. Dorcas showed us around the school, which has been open since 1997. They have a small cookhouse, a water tank (but no handwashing station) and two long wooden buildings for the classrooms.
We followed the same teaching set up at Marinya School, which was about a 15-minute drive from KK. Marinya School is made up of three long brick buildings, two of which are for classrooms, and the other is a teacher’s room. There is also a cookhouse and water tank at this school but no handwashing station. Again, we had a lot of fun teaching the students! We had so much fun with the girls and sang and danced with them when we were all done. At the end of our session with the girls, a large group of boys came running out into the field, in perfect form, all wearing a soccer jersey from the Van Leeuwens.
Both new schools were thrilled with the teaching and the nets and pads that they received. We had a great day and look forward to the next two schools will be going to.