Preparing for end of year celebrations

 Good evening happy day family...

We are almost coming to the end of 2024 academic year here in kenya...

As usual this is the shortest term in our academic year with only 9 weeks. All schools are scheduled to close by 25th October 2024. 

We have been waiting for the inspection to take place in our school but the inspectors have not come yet though the exercise is still ongoing.  

Most small informal schools have not yet had the inspection done.( maybe they started with bigger schools).

In third term we usually hold a graduation ceremony for our pre primary 2 class as the proceed to grade one. 

 Last year we didn't hold one for our current grade one class when they were in pp2 because of unavoidable circumstances.  

We have 15 pupils who are supposed to graduate this year....

We therefore request for facilitation to enable us to hold the ceremony.  

Our requirements are as follows:

1. Gowns @ 200 each....3000

2. Certificates @200......3000

3. Presents 15 piece @150...2250

4. Snacks ( all pupils).... 2000

5. Juice 5 litres @... 650

TOTAL.....10,900

We will be very grateful for the above facilitation. 

We are planning to hold the graduation on 22nd Oct and so we need to prepare this week for the event.

Have a blessed evening

In need of learning and teaching materials

 Learning is ongoing and the kids are not yet fully back. 

We attribute this to the ongoing public schools teachers strike. 

Hopefully by next week they will be fully back. 

This term we are scheduled to have a graduation ceremony for our pre
primary 2 class and we will include our grade 1 class because they didn't
celebrate this milestone last year. We hope to have the ceremony taking
place in the last week of this term. 

We are also planning to go for the fun day at a later date. 

We will inform you as soon as we get a report on the dates for it. 

We are short of Learning and teaching materials and therefore we request
that we get the most essential ones...

This are...

1. Chalks

2. Pencils

3. Pens

4. Writing books ( exercise books.

5. Crayon

6. Modeling clay

7. Office glue

8. Stick glue

9. Liquid soap

10. Toilet brush 

11. 3 buckets

12. 3 padlocks

13. Food items for the feeding program ( if possible)

14. Plain papers

15. Ruled papers 

16. sharpeners 

17. erasers 

This is a kind request from us. 

Have a blessed Thursday.

SvarVideresend Legg til en reaksjon

Update August 2024

Jambo Happy Day family.  

We hope you are all doing great. 

We at happy day are well and back to school for the third
and last term of 2024 academic year. We hope this term is
not disrupted as last term was. This term is going for 9 weeks
only making it the shortest academic term .

Last term was a very hard term for all of us in Kenya. 
First it was the floods which saw many households affected.  
At Happy day we had families which were very much affected
by the floods. Houses were swept away by the waters with every
belongings carried away too. Uniforms and books were not
spared either. This really affected the families because they had
to relocate with most of them not having an alternative place to go. 
Some were hosted by neighbors and friends while some had to go
to upcountry to seek for shelter. 

After the floods came the political unrests caused by the high cost
of living in Kenya. Life has become very hard with most families
not able to have their daily meals. Taxes are so high that people have
had to close their small businesses. 

Most parents at Happy day are casual laborers and due to the closure of
small businesses and exit of many companies they were rendered jobless
with no sources of income.  

It has really taken a toll on us at Happy day because we too are not able
to offer much help especially on the feeding program. We continued with
the feeding program with just a few parents being able to give the 20
shillings daily for food. It is such a hard task to budget for the food daily
because we also have to give food to the most vulnerable who we are
sure cannot afford the 20 shillings.  We also have to feed those affected
by the calamities and this has been a hard task to handle.  However little
we cook we have taught our kids to be a brother's keeper.  They have
learnt to share. At one time we had so little money that a teacher had to
cook at her home and bring food to the kids.  Another time I had to
carry rice and maize flour from home to enable us to feed the kids. 

We hope and pray that this term we get some help on the feeding program. 

Last term we didn't have any major extra curriculum activities due to the
above mentioned issues. We had planned to take our kids once every term
for a fun day but last term was an exception. This term we hope to take
them for the fun day at a day with we have not yet gotten the time and date. 

The government announced a schools compliance inspection
from last term. As at closing we were not yet inspected but the
ministry officials were in our zone. We expect them to pop in
any day now that we are back. They are checking to see that all
schools are a safe space for children and staff, they are also checking
if all schools are compliant and with the required teacher pupil ratio. 
Another requirement is the relevant licenses and if the teachers are
tsc registered. The cooks are also required to have a health and food
handlers certificate too. 

We are a safe space. Our teachers are compliant. We have the 2
most important licenses ( kra and ministry). We have 2 toilets
which is a good number because our population is not big. We have
a good number of teaching staff and so our classes are not congested.
Our kitchen is in a good condition and well equipped.  Our class
rooms are upto standard.  We have enough desks. We have a 5000
liters water storage tank. 

(the above makes us ready for the inspection).

The paint on our walls has fallen of and that's the only problem that
the inspectors might pin us on. We hope to have them painted (subject to
availability of funds)

We will keep you updated on the inspection and any other happenings.  

We are very grateful to the happy day friends and families for the great
support we receive.  Financial, advices, inputs, sacrifices and all kindness
shown to any of us including the children doesn't go unnoticed.  

We say Asante sana

Requirements to stay open

 Good morning Happy Day family.  

We trust you are all fine. 

Yesterday the government announced that it's starting a schools inspection and mapping program starting in June. This exercise targets all public, private and informal schools in the country.  

The inspection and mapping includes::

1. Checking if a school is a safe space for the kids.

2. If the school has enough toilets.

3. Child to teacher ratio.

4. Availability of teaching and learning materials. 

5. Compliance ( licenses)

6. Availability of extracurricular activities space.

7. School records...registers, admission books, attendance books, parent's contacts, visitor's book. 

8. Student -desk ratio.

9. Cleanliness. 

10. Compliance by teaching and non teaching staff ( health certificates, tsc numbers, lesson plans, schemes of work)

This year we have not gotten the relevant licenses and this might land us into problems during the exercise by the government.  

We are therefore requesting for at least 2 of them .... 

1. Ministry of education 

2. County government 

This 2 are the major ones and they are mostly the ones that are checked during such exercises.  

For extracurricular activities we have a space near the school where our children are able to play and create talents. 

We have 2 toilets that are functional though they need a few repairs. 

Our classroom are at a fair condition. .

We have enough desks for our kids. 

We have good water storage ( 3000 liter capacity tank). 

Our blackboards are good though in need of repainting). One classroom does not have a blackboard. 

Our staffs are compliant.  

We have a banner that we will hang outside the gate as our identity.  

The feeding program is ongoing though in need of a boost. 

All our records are upto date.  

We hope when they come they find us compliant in all areas though there is always some things that might pass our eyes

Heavy rains shuts down Happy day and affects families

Kenya has been hit by unprecedented heavy rains lately that has paralyzed huge parts of the country and killed several people. Happy day junior schools is temporary closed and families are struggling. PLEASE HELP:

This is how it looks (press the link and see video on Facebook)

Updates since February

Happy day is on their April break (3 weeks). Maggie and Ben has been providing  updates on a regular basis, and I am sorry I have not shared them here continuously. We have managed to pay salaries and extra expenses that has occurred due to an upgrade of the sewage system and the repair of the roof in one of the classrooms. See videos below. But we are struggling to cover expenses to the daily food programme, uniforms and other dire needs due to lack of funds. In addition to a shortage of money from sponsors, the exchange rate has worsened dramatically due to the weakening of the Norwegian krone. As an example, we paid NOK 685 for KSh 10000 in January. In March we had to pay NOK 870 for the same amount! Happy day suffers from this 💔 

We are in dire need of more funds! Our accounts are emptied.

Here are some insights from the last two months:

28 February 2024:
Jambo you all. We hope this finds you well. 

We at happy day are fine and striving to make the happy day kids stay happy in school and enjoy learning.  

Today tractors came to make a sewer line trench at our gate and we took the opportunity to have our septic tank connected to the sewer line bu negotiating with the foreman who agreed to do it at a cost of 13k. This is a permanent solution to our sewage system because from now henceforth we will not need the exhauster services.... we therefore request for the above amount so that we can be connected as soon as possible. .

This week is the mid term week and we were supposed to break on Thursday but due to the ongoing  work ( digging the trenches) we had to break today. We will be back on Monday next week. 

We were unable to do our mid term exams before the break because we couldn't afford to buy it. 

We discussed with the teachers and we will do the exams from Monday next week upto Wednesday.  

We are therefore requesting for 2k to enable us to buy the exams. 

Again we say Asante sana to you all for your kind help and thoughts towards us. Be blessed always. 

Attached are videos and pictures of the work in progress.  

More to come as work continues

11 March: Good morning you all. Our grade one class roof is down. Looks like someone stepped on it over the weekend. Our pellets ( cooking fuel) are also finished and today we had to buy charcoal.  

We are therefore requesting for 2800 so that we can order for the pellets. 

Have a blessed week

Estimate costs: 

2 iron sheets @1200= 2400

I timber........ 800

1 cement......850

2 buckets sand @250=500

2 buckets concrete @320=640

Labour fee..... 1500

TOTAL... 6690

Despite challenges the children play and have fun:

Good afternoon Happy day family.

We hope this finds you well.  

This is an appreciation note to you all for your support towards the wellbeing of Happy day kids and staff. We are very grateful to you and we feel blessed and pray that you too will be blessed.  

Our fun day was a big success all credit goes back to you for you made it possible.  

Most if not all of our pupils have never ventured our of the slums. 

They really enjoyed touring a new hood with a different infrastructure from theirs... 

They really marveled at what most of us take as normal.  

They could not stop staring at new things ( to them) . We hope they were encouraged to work smart . 

We left behind about 10 of our pupils for lack of uniform. As witnessed in the above pictures, the venue had many schools participating and it wasn't easy for teachers to identify kids other than see the uniforms.  

The 10 come from very very underprivileged homes and they are unable to afford uniforms... we nevertheless allow them to come without.

As we all know, this term we have not bought any stationary for the school and it is a big challenge to both the teachers and the pupils. 

We therefore request for the following items...  

1. Ream papers (2) @ 700 ...... 1400

2. Chalk..... @ 1200

3. Office glue @ 300

4. Biro pens ( red and blue)..... @ 500

5. Pencils... 5 pkts@ 750

6. Sharper @200

7. Eraser @200

8. Modeling clay... 20 pcs @.... 100....2000

9. A paper punch .... @500

10. Full scaps @... 550

TOTAL...7500.

It's also a kind request for foodstuff. 

We are running the feeding program from the 20 ksh the is paid by a few parents. 

A friend of mine had donated rice and it's finished and so now it's a bit of a challenge to us. 

And so we are requesting for food in order to keep the kids in school.  

We all know that most of them are in school because they are assured of a meal every week day. 

Kindly consider our request.  

Have a blessed day ahead