Rafiki link has been moving on well and I started with holding meetings with the Rafiki Link volunteers at the schools to see what we could do to make Rafiki Link a successful program. Some of the issues that we discussed are the equipments that are needed in this program, the activities that we are going to do this term and what are we going to do to motivate the students.
I was so encouraged by the teachers who have great passion and vision for this program.
We have the equipments that we require in the program though we still have problems at Ngeya because this school has no computer lab and I usually carry two of our office laptops which are not enough comparing it to the number of students that am working with, this has also been bringing inconvenience in that whenever my workmates are working on these computers I am forced to tell them to save their work and shut down the computers so that I can carry them to the Ngeya. We are hoping in future we are going to have more computers at Ngeya.
Maai- Mahiu secondary and Longonot secondary have enough computers though we still need some more internet connection, we have three modems that are being paid for by Bodwell High school and other two more modems that we are not able to use as they need some funds to run them.
At Maai- Mahiu secondary, this term I have been training the Rafiki club students on the basic computer skills because they doesn’t do computer packages as a subject though they have a computer lab but there is no teacher. I trained them how to use Microsoft office word because we will be mostly using it in making of newsletters which was our main target for this term and we also want to make a school magazine and this would be very helpful to the students. The students are very happy on knowing how to do text formatting spell checking and others though they say that something that they don’t like is typing, it has been a difficult thing for them to do. I think they need some typing programs that teach typing. The students are looking for some information that they are going to put together to make a school newsletter.
As I had said earlier on my last blog, there are some students who have some plastic bags recycling skills; they trained their friends how to make various items using the plastic bags that people throw everywhere in Maai- Mahiu town making the plastic bags look like flowers in the town. This has been a good way that people could utilise this bags in making such items. The students who are good in making those items made samples that were later sent to Free State High school in the US. The students worked very hard to get these items together and they said that they were making them also in the dormitory at night while sharing some stories with friends who also gained interest in making those items and were requesting to be part of it.
I also brain stormed with the students at Maai- Mahiu secondary about getting a market for our products. If the products would sell, their hope is to install internet in their computer lab so that even other students can learn how to use internet and this would be a very good research centre to get learning materials and also allow a lot of flow of information from school here and the schools in the west. Another idea was paying school fees for those who do not afford to pay and they also thought they could use the income to go for field trips which they have been longing to do. Others thought about beautifying the school compound by buying and planting trees. We are hoping that their dream will come true as time goes.
Longonot secondary Rafiki link has not been that smooth because here we usually use solar panels to power the laptops and mostly when I get there in the evening the power by that time is less and during this time the laptops goes off one by one making it very hard for the programs that we are working on. With the little time we have, the students have also been gathering information so that they will also make a newsletter.
In conclusion the program has been moving well and I have also been recording some videos of some of the events that we have been having here in Maai- Mahiu and you could check on our you tube videos .
By Paul Mwaniki
Rafiki Link coordinator.
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