Farther Together, BECAUSE OF YOU
- Kenya Works
- Mar 31
- 11 min read
Kenya Works is thrilled to share our 2024 Annual Report, highlighting the incredible impact made possible through your support.
Together, we reached 67,901 people last year — providing food and shelter, menstrual health solutions, education supports, and human rights training. Each number represents a life touched, a barrier removed, and a step toward lasting change.
Within these pages, you'll meet inspiring individuals like Nicholas, a young man coming of age within our shelter. Encouraged and supported by staff, he built a small home for himself and his younger siblings where they will soon live as a family. And Abigael, who courageously defied social norms that pressured her to undergo female genital mutilation and enter an early marriage. Instead of becoming a wife, she is now a proud junior in high school—part of a powerful coalition of 76 sponsored girls from her community who are advancing education for all and challenging the traditional limits placed on girls.
YOUR generosity is the foundation of these stories — proof that when we work together, we can create lasting opportunity for children, families and communities.
Together, we're building brighter futures. Well done Kenya Works Community! 👏👏👏
Shelter Works Pillar
Nicholas’s Journey: Finding Stability and Building a Future
Nicholas and his five siblings came to the Kenya Works Child Protection Center after their father abandoned them and their mother, leaving them without a home. As the eldest, Nicholas has long carried the weight of responsibility, making decisions for his siblings and supporting his mother through their struggles.
Now 17, he is wise beyond his years, but only in junior high, with his education delayed by the family’s instability. He remains determined to create a better future for himself and his younger siblings and is dedicated to completing his education.
Nicholas and the younger children spend time with their mother during school breaks. He began saving money from odd jobs, eventually purchasing a small cooker and gas for her so she would no longer have to collect firewood in the rain. Last year, he missed school to search for a younger sibling who had dropped out, strengthening his resolve to complete his education and support his family.
At the center, Nicholas discovered his passion for farming. Initially unsure of his interests, he began volunteering to care for the animals, particularly the rabbits. This experience led him to explore gardening, where he learned to cultivate vegetables and flowers. Today, he is a regular at the program gardens, spending hours refining his skills in sustainable agriculture.
With his savings of 2,000 shillings, he shared plans to build a small room on his late grandfather’s land—a space where he and his siblings could stay during school breaks. The child protection staff came together to help him purchase the 1,500 bricks needed for construction.
When heavy rains delayed the project, Nicholas remained steadfast, buying a wheelbarrow to symbolize progress toward his dreams. The delay opened a new opportunity. Joseph, a social work intern at the shelter had come to know Nicholas and be a great mentor to him. Joseph grew up in the same community that Nicholas and his family hailed from. As the rains ended, Joseph was finalizing his internship. Knowing the area and the challenges, he offered to guide Nicholas in the construction of his new home. Together, they worked tirelessly for countless hours, eager to see the young man’s dream take shape.
Today, Nicholas’ dream is a reality. It is more than just four walls; it is a symbol of love, resilience and the power of community. In the near future, Nicholas and his siblings will leave the shelter and finally have a home of their own, a place where laughter and dreams can flourish.
His resilience combined with the supportive community and services of the child protection center are living proof that children do overcome even the most challenging circumstances, not only lifting themselves, but lifting others as they rise, building lasting change for the next generations.
In 2024, the Kenya Works Child Protection Center admitted 491 children providing 58,330 nights of shelter and 356,699 plates of food to sheltered children. Each child has a case manager who ensures the child's physical and mental well-being, and school enrollment and attendance. Additionally, extensive family outreach is undertaken, with the goal of situating sheltered children back into a home setting. Last year, 361 children were reintegrated into a home situation in their community and each of the families received individualized supports to ensure success.
The Center also provides community outreach through 2 feeding locations, enrolling each child, verifying they are attending school and connecting with parents to offer additional support services. Through ongoing engagement, parents can access counseling services, parental training and economic empowerment workshops.
Last year, 619,958 plates of food were served to 2,200 people in 721 families through the outreach feeding program. An incredible 32,400 counseling hour were provided to 1,800 unique individuals across both the outreach and child protection center. Of those families, 120 participated in parental training and 120 participated in the economic empowerment workshops.
MHH Works Pillar
Breaking Barriers: Atieno’s Journey to Confidence and Success
Atieno, a bright and determined 14-year-old student at Kandiege Primary School in Homa Bay County, has faced challenges familiar to many girls in her community. For the past two years, she has benefited from Kenya Works
Menstrual Health & Hygiene (MHH) solutions.
The MHH program provides Kenya Works Makini Pad kit, a safe, comfortable and eco-friendly menstrual product.
This simple yet transformative intervention allowed her to attend school consistently, free from the fear of accidents or shame. With improved attendance, her academic performance soared, and for the first time, she felt confident and focused in class.
Additionally, her perceptions about menstruation changed when she learned about this normal female biology. Both girls and boys were trained, so the education went a long way to removing the stigma and myths about periods that pervaded her culture.
Like many schools across Kenya, the WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene) facilities at Kandiege Primary School were outdated, unhygienic pit toilets. The stalls didn’t offer girls space for changing sanitary pads, making it difficult for Atieno and her classmates to manage their periods with dignity. In 2024, Atieno’s school faced a crisis when the pit latrines failed in heavy flooding. The school needed to build new bathrooms or risk closing, which would have displaced 350 children.
In response, Kenya Works partnered with the school on the construction of modern, safe and private toilet blocks designed to meet the needs of both girls and boys. Parents volunteered to help with the construction, bringing the community together around the importance of WASH and MHH in promoting girls' health and well-being.
Mr. Okuyo, Atieno’s teacher, proudly shared, "This new facility is more than just a structure—it is a symbol of dignity, care and hope. We are raising a generation of empowered young women."
The holistic Kenya Works Menstrual Health and Hygiene efforts at Kandiege Primary School transformed Atieno’s educational experience. No longer held back by the stigma of menstruation, she sees herself becoming a nurse in the future. Atieno shows us that when we build a period-friendly world, girls will create bigger, brighter futures.
In 2024, Atieno was one of 31,500 girls Kenya Works provided with free Kenya Works Makini Pads kits and MHH training. Without these products, Kenyan girls miss an average of four days of school each month. Your support helped girls reclaim an estimated 126,000 of school days each month.
Additionally, 7,500 Boxers for Boys were distributed, engaging boys in creating a period-friendly world. A total of 46,808 youth were trained on menstrual health and hygiene, replacing stigma and myths with knowledge and healthy attitudes about this natural biological process.
Education Works Pillar
Abigael: A Golden Achiever’s Fight for Change
Abigael grew up in the Maasai community of Musenke, a semi-arid pastoral region of Kenya where generations before her have stewarded the land, herding goats and cattle as their livelihood.
The sixth child in a family of ten, she knows the unique shape of poverty for indigenous communities where extreme climate and land dispossession result in a lack of basic infrastructure, including roads, electricity, clean water and schools.
The Maasai are globally renowned for their rich heritage of colorful dress, beaded jewelry and storytelling dance. In some communities, the beauty of these traditions is marked by a darker side of harmful cultural practices, including female genital mutilation (FGM) and early marriage. In communities where FGM is practiced, it is often considered a traditional rite of passage symbolizing that a girl is ready for marriage. These practices pose a prominent public health concern and human rights violation rooted in deeply entrenched gender inequality.
Girls face heightened vulnerabilities for FGM / early marriage in the long school break that follows their 8th-grade year, the end of Kenya’s compulsory education requirement. A complex array of forces—pastoral poverty, cultural preservation and social norms of female inequality—merge at this time in an adolescent girl’s life, leading her to a singular, life-altering outcome.
This is where Abigael found herself as the 2023 school year ended. Though she wanted to continue her education, her father was determined. Like her sisters before her and generations before them, she too would go for FGM and find a husband; she would not be enrolled in secondary school. If she didn’t follow the expectations, he feared she would not be accepted as a bride and would be shunned in the community.
But she was equally determined to stay in school and not be subjected to FGM or early marriage. Knowing she would need outside help to challenge these entrenched expectations, she sought help from the pastor’s wife, who alerted local authorities. The area chief intervened, putting an end to the planned FGM.
Abigael’s story reached Kenya Works at a crucial moment. The organization was launching a pilot initiative in her community to introduce societal, community and individual interventions at scale to upend the entrenched norms. While FGM and child marriage are illegal in Kenya, enforcement is complex. Pairing the legal framework with social behavior change strategies is a proven way to successfully intervene.
Kenya Works has been delivering this kind of community change training since 2017. With the Transformative Power of Education (TPE) launched late in 2023, Kenya Works began piloting a new effort to combine sponsorship at scale with social behavior change efforts.
Through TPE, an initial group of 50 girls in Musenke at risk of FGM/early marriage would receive 4-year sponsorships. In conjunction, Kenya Works would provide tools and training at the community level to empower community leaders, parents and youth to change these practices and expectations. A later group of 26 girls joined in 2024, as the Kenyan school system changed to three years of high school bringing the total to 76 girls in the community.
Abigael was welcomed into the Musenke Group TPE pilot in late 2023. The education sponsorship includes the academic years of January 2024 through January 2027 (2025 - 2027 for the latter group), seeing the girls through their high school education. Once the group was formed, their first empowerment activity was to name their group and define their values as a team. They call themselves "The Golden Achievers," representing their dedication to education and a brighter future for all.
Kenya Works facilitators also began working with the girls’ families as a group, engaging support from local leaders across government, churches and women’s groups to co-create an empowering supportive society for all. An important proof point? By the end of her first year in 2024, Abigael's father—once a staunch supporter of FGM—has now become an advocate for girls' education and their right to a future of opportunity.
At the end of their 9th grade year, the girls safely left their boarding schools, returning home secure in their safety and futures, representing a new generation and path for girls. During the school holiday, they gathered as a group for a two-week stay at the Kenya Works campus, embracing a new rite of passage—a celebration of educated girls who advocate for their rights and for those of other girls in their communities—creating a new chapter in their long and storied Maasai heritage.
Now in 10th grade, Abigael has become a leader in The Golden Achievers, at school and in her community, standing as a fierce advocate against FGM and an ambassador for girls' education.
Her journey is one of transformation—rippling from the individual through the family, community and society, reshaping her culture into an inclusive one of educated girls. She has inspired other girls to resist FGM; her father’s change in perspective has encouraged open conversations about girls’ rights within their household. Kenya Works’ holistic approach—providing sponsorship, mentorship and community social behavior change training—has strengthened community bonds and sparked a cultural shift.
Her story proves that access to education is more than classroom learning—it is a catalyst for breaking cycles of poverty, changing gender norms and empowering future generations.
Abigael dreams of becoming a lawyer, fighting for the rights of girls who, like her, refuse to accept traditions that deny girls and women opportunities. She is a Golden Achiever—a beacon of hope for a better, more just future.
In 2024, Abigael was one of 874 individual students who were sponsored and 100% transitioned to the next grade or graduated, 97% participated in mentorship and community service projects and 80% maintained a grade of C or better.
In addition to sponsorship, Kenya Works provided 346,456 plates of school lunch for 2,388 students, knowing the important connection between nutrition and learning. Kenya Works' third education opportunity is infrastructure. Last year, donations combined with community labor saw the construction of new toilets at a partner school, ensuring the school could open its doors and 350 children were not displaced at the start of the school year.
Community Works Pillar
Faiza: Rebuilding a Future Through Education and Advocacy
At 38, Faiza, a mother of four, is determined to rewrite her story–for herself, her children and her community. Growing up in poverty, she left school after 7th grade when her parents divorced. Now, she is committed to ensuring her children receive the education and opportunities she was denied.
In 2022, Faiza’s passion for advocacy was ignited after attending a Kenya Works Community Works forum focused on human rights-based parenting, children’s rights and building empowering communities.
The training helped her come to terms with her personal experience of being denied education as a violation of her rights. Rather than focusing on what she lost, she used her expertise to change the future for others.
Since the Kenya Works forum in 2022, she has been involved in mentorship programs within schools to fight entrenched harmful cultural practices such as female genital mutilation (FGM), early marriage and gender-based violence. County government leaders have also tapped her to speak with women’s and girls' groups. Applying skills and knowledge built through the Kenya Works training, she is now a voice for challenging injustices, despite not holding formal educational credentials. Faiza’s commitment to protecting girls' rights and supporting vulnerable individuals has made her a powerful force for change.
Recognizing her dedication and impact, Kenya Works invited Faiza to a 2024 advanced training workshop at the Kenya Works campus. The curriculum is designed for dedicated advocates activating change in their communities using their KWCW community training.
Advocates from across Kenya gathered for two days to workshop practical applications of lessons from the first training, formulate best practices and gain new information on assessing community knowledge, attitudes and practices around gender-based violence and child protection. Additionally, the training strengthened participants’ ability to identify key elements of an enabling environment, empowering them to advocate for social change within their respective counties.
By investing in these committed mobilizers, Kenya Works is ensuring that grassroots advocates like Faiza are equipped to keep advancing progress at the local level, a critical need for sustainable human rights development. Faiza’s leadership is a testament to recognizing skills and action over academic qualifications.
After 24 years away from the classroom, in 2022, Faiza re-enrolled in school. Driven by a deep desire to inspire her children, she also knows that completing her education will open doors to employment and leadership roles. She wants to pursue a political career to serve even more people.
Her story is one of perseverance and courage and the belief that change begins with one determined step forward. Faiza underscores the power of possibility when we invest in grassroots changemakers.
Faiza is one of 698 community leaders Kenya Works trained on activating human rights in her community last year. In addition, 3,370 girls and 1,021 parents were trained on ending FGM and early marriage. Our facilitators traveled across the country reaching 11 out of Kenya's 47 counties in 2024.