AKILI DADA: Educating Women in Kenya

     I have spent the last month or so interacting with Wanjiru Kamau-Rutenberg, the founder of Akili Dada, a start-up which is funding education for smart women in high school who need the financial and social support resources to get through high school.    In a number of ways, this adjunct professor  of politics and an Ethnic Minority Dissertation Fellow at University of San Francisco reminds me of my long time inspiration, Prof. Wangari Maathai. Her willingness to tap into the top girls and support them is inspirational, and an important resource for women in Africa and the diaspora.

For those who do not speak Swahili, Akili (Ah-keeley) means intellect, ability, strategy, knowledge, competence and Dada (Dad-uh) means Sister; a term of endearment and respect among women.

Akili Dada is an international non-profit organization which is dedicated to providing education opportunities for women in a manner that acknowledges the dignity and respect of the African woman. The organization provides scholarships and leadership training to the girls and offer the future leaders a chance to network with mentors and peers. Akili Dada awarded its first four scholarships in February 2006. This year, the organization more than doubled its number of grants. In Kenya, the group is a registered nonprofit; in the United States, it operates as a global support fund of the Tides Foundation.

Kenya has produced  illustrious female scholars, professionals, and leading experts in their fields, who have given us a series of firsts. Many of the leading women have sponsored school fees on a one-off basis or for a season. Akili Dada introduces a structured approach to sustainable educational investment in a helpful way to build Africa’s future women leadership by opening up the opportunity to invest to a wider audience.

In an interview for her alma mater, Whitman College, “The goal of Akili Dada is to nurture a generation of women leaders while restoring hope for young Kenyan women — hope that lets them see how vision and hard work can lead to success,” said Kamau-Rutenberg. “You’ve got dynamite if you can identify a brilliant young woman who has already overcome unspeakable poverty, link her to a network of her peers and other professional Kenyan women, and eliminate the burden of worry about school fees.” In another article in the San Francisco Foghorn, Kamau-Rutenberg says, “Akili Dada is about more than education. It’s about creating future leaders, infusing the girls with confidence to be whatever they want to be when they grow up. It’s more than just sending tons of people to school. They’re going to finish and excel beyond that.”One board member views Akili Dada as a ‘feminist, collaborative approach to empowering women’.

Akili Dada is offering students enpowerment through education, which is a value-based approach to donating to a cause. I always heard, and believe, that if you educate a woman, you educate her whole village. Think of the impact of an educated woman on the global village.

For more information on Wanjiru Kamau-Rutenberg’s work, visit akilidada.org, or read her blog for updates on Akili Dada at wanjirukr.blogspot.com

A Kenyan Guide To Corporate Careers in the USA

Disclaimer: The views expressed herein are purely mine. it does not necessarily represent the views of any of the author(s) or contributors to the Career Guide.

Whenever good information on education comes out, one really never hears about it. Kenyan Professionals USA have done us proud.
Often our interaction with people doing well comes from the older generation grapevine, where the mother set will tell stories of so-and-so, working in (insert US city of your choice), great job, he was just lucky. This group of Kenyan professionals have talked and decided to do something about this information gap.

Within the mainstream corporate culture here, it is easy to focus on the woes and not the great network of Kenyans who are pursuing successful careers in the corporate world. This guide to corporate careers in the USA is great for anyone interested in the corporate experiences of Kenyans in the USA.

We have a rich tradition of excellence among academics and professionals all over the world, and this group came together in 2006 to prepare a guide for Kenyans to plug into resources for the next level of professional engagement.

Your instructions are clear. Just read the guide. Do not hesitate to read for yourself. We come from a culture where people like to be told via radio, clarion etc. Like all guides, you figure where you are in the thought process and get spreading the word people.

Teaching Entrepreneurship

Reading the posts on KBW always refreshes me, for all the times that I have read egm,
aco , kenyanmusings, mwariwadavid and many many others, I am proud to be associated. Join my foray into social innovation, entrepreneurship, development projects and travel.

Can one really teach entrepreneurship? The idea that the skills to start up and successfully run your own business are at hand within a teaching module begs every one to consider the possibility for testing the effectiveness of teaching these skills. In a normal class, every person learns and receives the same curriculum, then each takes the same administered test and then after that, the proficiency in the testing serves as a measure of how well you have assimilated the course material.

However, the truth is that standardized assessment tests are woefully bad at determining learning because many of them rely on the ability to reproduce the course material for the examiner and they rely wholly on rote memorization to achieve this level of knowledge. I am not discounting the fact that there are people, who learn from a certain course and retain that knowledge through analysis and application of the material, but it does prompt me to wonder, can we teach entrepreneurship skills be taught to non-traditional learners without this emphasis on standardized testing.

 In the United States, the National Foundation For Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE) is the premier youth teacher in the field of entrepreneurship. The Foundation believes that young people can learn the skills needed to change their own financial futures at any age. I have a feeling that this particular area of business skills can be taught to young women especially because learning a trade, such as hairdressing is only as successful as your management.

 Ryan P. Allis, a young entrepreneurship teacher said:

“Only by teaching does one really learn the material. Through teaching entrepreneurship I added quite a bit to my knowledge about entrepreneurship and business. I learned about Porter’s Five Forces, additional types of alternative financing, new distribution models, the marketing wheel, and a new type of break-even analysis.

Just as important, however, was my learning about people and leadership. I learned how to relate and connect to younger teenagers. I learned how to handle a position of authority. I learned how to write a forty-five minute speech in two hours. I learned teaching styles. I learned that if you know what you are talking about and can gain someone’s trust, he or she will follow you. I learned how to inspire and motivate. I learned how to understand motives and read the body language and tone of a person. I learned how to build rapport and relationships. And I learned how to go ten days with forty hours of sleep.”

I need to learn how to teach entrepreneurship and business skills.

Have an enterprising Friday

 

K.C.S.E Results

I was awoken yesterday to the IM Message: “Oe, Sorre! Tumewashinda, Strathmore is number 2 overall!” If you are not aware, I went to one of those schools which forever features in the top ten of the country’s best schools. ( Yes, I do say-only when results are out) This year, as this IM indicated, my alma mater was trounced. I was naturally pulled away from the task at hand to the nation/Standard front pages(the ones we can access for free) to see what it was that was the rank. Aaargh! When we were there we were kings! My old school had indeed been trounced by the fellas once again. To be fair, however, there was a fair distribution of girls from the school in the top 100 of the province, so that was a relief.

Before I delve into a monologue about the vagaries of the 8.4.4 system, I would like to thank M-Oh-Wan( Baba) for introducing the system that has produced the most hardened students in the history of Kenya. Guys of 7.6.3 if you are reading this, my disclaimer is that I was not there in your day, and have no direct quotes at you. In this country, the 8.4.4 kids I know are topping in major disciplines and shining in their campus communities. Of course, as you may know, I have not met the full gamut of Kenyans, no quantifiable data exists, et cetera. We are very tough, the system did something.

Back to the results. I was surprised to hear that not one girl attempted Aviation Technology in 2006. More saddening to me was the fact that even though more girls than boys attempted the exam, girls ranked poorly in major subjects. I am all for women and the figures are disheartening. On a cheerier note, I received an email from a relative who sat the KCSE last year with the email of the results. In this era of tech savvy youth, I suppose one could check online and then send the results to one’s nearest and dearest. In spite of the fact that the said rela had done very well, the usual rank and file of applying to public universities may overlook obvious good grades in favor of the overall point system. I am proud of my rela! As we would say (clap, clap, clap)”Good!” (clap, clap, clap)”Vyema” (clap, clap, clap)”you have made us proud”.

K.C.S.E is brutal testing if I ever saw any, so if you meet recent result receivers, do not forget to acknowledge their efforts.

Have a resultant Thursday!

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