I am Elphas Onyango Otanga, a beneficiary of Kijana Educational Empowerment Initiative in the rural Western Kenya, in Africa. I’m the sixth born in a family of eight; that is my parents and five siblings.

I knew Kijana while schooling at Ebusiloli Primary School in my home area. As an organization, Kijana was sponsoring my school and the neighboring secondary school in a bid to improve education standards so as to enlighten the community. The organization did this by improving learning conditions such as school infrastructure by constructing modern classrooms, science laboratories, walkways and purchasing learning materials that we were lacking.

My personal encounter with  was in 2005 after I did my Primary national exam. I scored 363 Kijana Educational Empowerment Initiative out of 500 marks but my parents had no funds to enable me to join secondary school education, a condition attributed to my humble family background. Kijana Educational Empowerment Initiative came to rescue my dreams by funding my secondary and University education, giving me a rare opportunity to access education I was yearning for. I am now a trained high school teacher in Kenya currently teaching Geography and Kiswahili at Kiaguthu Boys High School in Murang’a county.

I view Kijana as the best organization that has transformed individual youths and a community as a whole in my home area of Ebusiloli, in rural western Kenya. Educating a community is an act of equipping it with tools necessary for shaping life. Going forward, I would like to be a part of people impacting to the less fortunate groups in the society in shaping their lives socially and economically. God bless Kijana.Educational Empowerment Initiative supporters. To each one and all of you, we say; Asante sana.