Empower, Engage, Educate in Rural Kenya!

Happy 2022!  We are thrilled that in our 20th Anniversary year that our LRC Annex will be opening!  Construction work slowed during the holidays, but now the craftsmen are back on the job and doing the finishing touches on the building. The architect and contractor are confident that we will be moving into the new building by mid-February. Our staff is working on furniture lay-out and plans for setting up all the special spaces including the Library and Maker Space.

We are especially excited that at the end of January/beginning of February that will will be receiving 20,000 books for our library from Books for Africa. This donation, coupled with our 10,000 book collection, means that our library will be filled with a wide range of books for the community to borrow.  

We are also pleased to announce that we purchased an additional half acre piece of property adjacent to the LRC Annex. Currently we do not have plans for the property, but it provides us with future flexibility and ensures that a business that might be disruptive to our educational endeavors will not be our neighbor.

Accessibility is extremely important to us and the new building has a ramp that will allow for easier access to the library. We can hardly wait to see students, teachers, parents and community members using this new building. School will be on break in March and April and we already have plans to hold enrichment camps in the Maker Space and Library.

We thought as a donor to Kenya Connect, you would be interested to see our 2021 Highlights. Our comprehensive work would not be possible without donors like you. Thank you for being such a wonderful friend to Kenya Connect!  We will be sending an update in February when we begin to move in!

This year's Reading Challenge King and Queen were crowned this month! The Kenya Connect Reading Challenge, now in its third year, challenges students to read 25 books to become a reading champion. With colorful guides created by students at Garrison Forest School, the students record the books they have read. This year's reading challenge theme was water, and in addition to providing space to list the books, the guides had fun water facts and word games and activities.

Jorma was crowned King for reading 166 books and is a student at the Wamunyu Junior Academy grade 5.

 He shared, "I am very happy to be the King Reader in Kenya Connect Reading Challenge 2021. I attribute this to the effort and courage I got after participating in the crowning of the King and Queen reader in 2020. I promised myself to read many books in the next Challenge. Yes, I got it. My secret was after reading the two books that I used to check out, I would borrow more books from my friends. I loved reading books from the Magic Tree House series. My favorite title was the Dragon King in which Jack and Annie saved the book that was to be burned. I would urge my fellow learners to be checking out books and reading them. Did you know that I also enjoyed learning more about water from the Reading Challenge guide illustrations?"

Purity, a student from Kaliambeu in grade 8 is this year's Queen. She read 254 books and shared,

 "I am very excited to be the Queen reader in the Kenya Connect Reading Challenge. Even though I used to check out two big volume books with my library card, I would go a step further to borrow more books from my classmates My favorite book was Power of Three by Diana Wynne Jones .I learnt that you should not envy your friends. I would like to encourage other learners to read books and not to judge books by their covers. There are some books without pictures but when you read them you find that they are very interesting. Through reading many books during the Challenge, I have gained a lot of vocabulary. My fluency in English communication has improved and also my composition writing skills."

 Our Librarian Esther shared this reflection, "The Reading Challenge has given learners a competitive opportunity and exciting time to read and interact with as many books as possible. It has actually spurred the love of books among many learners.The gifts that we are issuing are making learners to get more excited about reading books.They are a great motivation for learners to read more books in the coming Reading Challenge."

We are thrilled that 325 other students completed the challenge by reading 25+ books. All winners received a drawstring bag created by women in the community and screened by our staff. They also received some pencils too. This program is helping us to grow a community of readers.

We are deeply grateful to the students at Garrison Forest School for creating the Reading Challenge guides and the Henry E. Niles Foundation for support for the prizes.  Donations from friends like you helped us build our School Library program and have helped stocked our library so students have a wide variety of books to read.  We are deeply grateful.

Wamunyu is becoming, "The Village That Reads." Thank you for opening the joy, wonder and knowledge of books to our community.  Wishing you and your family a peaceful and healthy holiday season.