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Improving learning outcomes through mentorship in Viwandani slums Nairobi Kenya: Youth mentoring primary school pupils out of mainstream class setting.

Thu, March 9, 8:00 to 9:30am, Sheraton Atlanta, Floor: 1, Georgia 2 (South Tower)

Proposal

Objectives or purposes
While free primary education in Kenya has seen a steady increase in school enrollment rates, many players in this sector are still struggling with quality learning outcomes (Deininger, 2003; Oketch & Somerset, 2010). According to Benta et al (2015) the scarce teachers that are available are unable to handle high number of children whose enrollment rate was up to 104% in 2004 in Kenya.
The Advancing Learning Outcomes for Transformational Change project is a three-year study with a goal of seeking to increase efforts towards securing the future of children in the urban informal settlements by improving learning outcomes, transition to secondary schools, leadership skills and social behavior among girls and boys aged 12-19 years who live in urban informal settlements. The objectives of the project are to establish whether there is a differential effect of the proposed intervention on learning outcomes and transition to secondary school between boys and girls in Viwandani, to examine whether mentoring in life skills impacts differently among girls and boys in terms of positive behavior, aspirations, interest in schooling and self-confidence, to establish the impacts of leadership skills on various outcomes among boys and girls in the study communities, to establish whether parental sensitization component of the intervention increases parents and community leaders support towards children’s education in Viwandani Nairobi Kenya.
The project targets to directly impact on 600 standard six boys and girls as from 2016 to 2018. Those who will attain a minimum of 250 out of possible 500 marks in their Kenya Certificate of Primary Education will be aided with a subsidy that will help them transit to secondary school.
U-Tena in partnership with African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) ensures boys and girls in Viwandani in Nairobi Kenya are offered after school mentorship in literacy, numeracy, life skills and leadership for one hour per session by mentors who are university students or recent graduates and grew up in Viwandani. Pupils are also taken for academic trips annually and exposed to motivational talks quarterly. Parents of the said pupils are counseled on the importance of investing in their children’s education for one hour on quarterly basis.
APHRC carry out monitoring and evaluation, offers leadership, communicate to donors and use generated evidence to engage policy makers.
Theoretical/conceptual framework used.
Bright and young former or present residents on Viwandani slums will improve the learning outcomes and transition to secondary and secure the future of primary school children from poor households by mentoring them through the lens of their experiences. Subsidies will increase chances of transition from primary to secondary school.
Analytical methods, research design, or modes of inquiry
The data of this intervention project is progressively collected on weekly by tracking the number of pupils that attend each session by use of a register, diary and mentor’s uptake tools. Pupil’s progressive performance is tracked by getting their performance in their every end term examination in their mainstream school by comparing their performance with their classmates who don’t attend mentorship sessions. Counselors record their sessions on counselor’s uptake tools. The data was classified and processed by use of SPSS functions
Data sources or evidence
Project’s participants were recruited from APHRC’s Nairobi Urban and Health Demographic Surveillance System. Number of hours that each pupils was exposed to each session was obtained from attendance register, duration of interaction between pupils, parents and mentors was obtained from the diaries, topics covered in each session was obtained from mentors uptake tools, end term examination scores are obtained from mainstream school through pupils report form at the end of every academic term. Topics parents are taken through counseling sessions are obtained from counselor’s uptake tools.

Results and/or conclusions
Up to now 89.25% of the targeted children have successfully attended the sessions. By the beginning the third quarter of the first year 28 literacy, 30 numeracy, 8 life skills, 4 leadership, 1 academic trip and 3 motivational talks have been done. Parents accounting to 84% have been counseled. There was overall of 11% gain between term one and two in academic performance. It is anticipated that there will be more academic gain by the end of the third year.
Significance of the study to the field of comparative and international education
This presentation seeks to demonstrate how research intervention is improving learning outcomes through organization’s and community partnership based on each partner’s competitive advantage and how the model can be adjusted and be implemented in other parts of the globe.

Authors