Thomas: New Sponsored Child!
Hello everyone, While we were out in Kenya this time we had the opportunity to sponsor another child onto the programme. Thomas is 10 years old and is now in Standard 5 at Mtwapa Academy along with Safari and Kaingu. I think they had better watch out too, since Thomas will certainly soon be competing with them for the top spot in class!
Thomas is the youngest child of a family we know very well. They are extremely hardworking and intelligent, almost all of Thomas's elder brothers and sisters having attended extremely high level secondary schools. However, the family have recently fallen on hard times. Thomas's father, who was the main provider in the home, a dedicated and very intelligent man unfortunately passed away just less than two years ago. After his death, with a very large family and one disabled son to support, Thomas's mother found it very difficult to sustain school fees for her two youngest children, Thomas and George. Both were achieving very high marks and with George just months away from his final Primary Examinations she was at a loss over what to do.
Eventually she was forced to send the children away to stay with some extended family so that George could take his final exams at a free Government primary school. These schools are often hopelessly overcrowded with more than 100 children to a classs, very poor facilities, no textbooks, desks, teaching or even writing materials. George received his marks at the end of January and I am pleased to report that, in spite of everything he managed to get exceptionally high grades and was offered a place at one of the best secondary schools in the whole country.
However, Thomas was still only in Standard 4, and with another four long years of Primary education in a poor quality government school ahead of him, the whole family was concerned that this would seriously affect his marks and performance, impacting on the level of secondary school he could attend and therefore his entire future. Thanks to many of your kind donations we were able to take on Thomas as part of the Milele group and assist his mother in his education. Now she can focus all her efforts on getting George through secondary school without needing to worry about paying for Thomas's fees too. Thomas can also look forward to a future he deserves and has worked so hard for.
He is a lovely boy with a fantastic sense of humour, he is great fun to be around. I am sure he will settle into life at Mtwapa Academy in no time at all and reach his academic potential.
