I started my school from house in slum

Mrs Pricilla Mwangi started by offering three children evening lessons but this has grown into a fully-fledged school.

She and her husband Mr Willy Mwangi lived in a small house in Nakuru’s Kwa Murogi slum. In the evening the house was a beehive of activity as it was turned into a classroom. Noises of excited children filled the room.

When she told her husband about the idea of turning the house into a classroom of sorts, he was hesitant. However the couple was jobless and they had to put food on the table. He gave it the green light albeit reluctantly.

Mrs Mwangi then started approaching their neighbours to allow her to coach their children for a small fee. She wanted to teach the children as she looked for a stable job.

The lessons did not take off to a smooth start and she almost gave up when the challenges multiplied. Pupils were hard to come by. It was not easy for her to convince the parents living in the slum on the need to educate their children. She faced a host of other challenges with some of her friends and neighbours casting doubt about her project.

Even the children who were already taking her lessons presented their own set of difficulties. “With the seven pupils’ parents unable to pay fees and some abusing me, I almost gave up,” she recalled.

After one year, her pupils performed better than their peers in the formal schools. This was the breakthrough she needed to take his idea to the next level. More children enrolled for her lessons.

“In the second year I had 25 pupils and I could not hold lessons in my house at Kwa Murogi slums anymore. I opted to rent an empty room,” she recalled adding the her pupils also spoke better English.

More children joined her class as their parents sough to improve their performance. In a short time the number of students shot up from 25 to 65.Soon the news of the nursery school “where children performed brilliantly” spread like a wildfire.

“Despite more opposition from neighbours and friends, soon more children began enrolling for my lessons,” she said with a smile. 

Seeing the prospects of the school getting brighter each day, Mr Mwangi also took to the chalk and started teaching the pupils.

With the number of learners growing in leaps and bounds, the couple rented three more rooms. Soon St Monica Education Centre was born. They began taking in orphans and children whose parents could not afford school fees.

TOO POOR TO AFFORD

Mrs Mwangi employed four other teachers. Because the teachers had to be paid, the school required every parent to pay at least Sh1,000 per term.

“As the population of the pupils increased I was forced to employ other teachers because I could not manage alone,” she said.
Mrs Mwangi noted that most parents were too poor to afford the Sh1,000 fee. Although she faced a series of challenges, her dream of owning a modern school never died. She diligently saved the little she got from the pupils’ parents.

Her husband who had been helping her quit to look for a job in Nairobi in a bid to raise enough money to pay the teachers.

“I had to be employed as a shamba boy ( farm hand) in Nairobi where I was paid Sh9,000 which we used to pay the teachers,” Mr Mwangi told Money.

Ten years since it was set up, St Monicha school registered 14 candidates for their Kenya Certificate of Primary Education examinations last year.

The top student attained 385 marks.Mrs Mwangi said that although they are proud of the results, they are saddened that a good number of pupils dropped out due to early pregnancy and drug abuse.

In January 2014, Mrs Mwangi had saved enough to start a modern school.
“We bought a three acre piece of land in Lanet area in Nakuru where we began construction of classrooms for our first stream,” she said.And as the school opened its doors in December, it will be a dream come true for the Mwangis.