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Geoff and Rita Fowler |
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When Rita and Geoff married, Rita was a nurse and Geoff a Civil Engineer.
After a pause in her working life to bring up their two daughters Rita embarked
upon a new career as a teacher. Geoff meanwhile continued his career in civil engineering
and was a director of a large construction company before becoming a business consultant
working with charities and not-for-profit organisations. He is also a trustee of
several local charities, with experience of bid writing and fund raising.
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In 2006 Rita retired from teaching, Geoff was self-employed, they decided that
it was time to see the world. In September 2008, after two exciting years exploring
they went to Kenya on Safari.
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They loved Kenya and its warm, friendly people and on their return from Safari
decided to see as much of the local community as possible. On the final day of
their holiday they visited an informal school in Mgongeni, a poor suburb of
Mombasa.
Two young Kenyan men were trying to run a school for poor children
in the most appalling conditions. Two small rooms with mould on the walls, makeshift
furniture some exercise books and pencils and a blackboard were their only resources.
But the children were happy and focussed.
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They listened as the two young men explained the current situation along with their dream. They
said that education
in Kenya had been free for primary school children since 2002. Unfortunately the
government had not built additional schools and so children were in classes of
between 80 and 150 and this was only available to people who could pay for uniform and stationery.
People with sufficient money paid for private education with small classes but
this was not open to poor children.
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None of their children could afford to pay fees and they would have been on the
street with no education and exposure to drugs and abuse. David and Bernard
worked as night security guards to fund the school including feeding the
children many of whom came to school hungry. |
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Rita and Geoff looked at these two young men who were sharing what little they
had and knew that they couldn’t walk away. They didn't know what they were going
to do at this time but they did know that they had skills to help and turning
away was not an option.
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