Pathfinder Acadamy

Through the program, Village Volunteers, Holly, Jen, and Amanda, start working with 14 pre-teen girls who sleep and attend school at Pathfinder Academy. The teens board at the school because it's too far away from their village and it's too dangerous for them to walk miles just to go to classes. Sadly, at least four of these girls are victims of rape or attempted sexual violence. So the principal/program director, Joshua built the Pathfinder Academy for safety. There are also three huts that house the volunteers. A funny thing about the houses there are that chickens are always strutting around laying eggs in random rooms, using people's blankets and pillows as a nest. 

At the camp, the girls, Jen, Holly, and Amanda join Yale student and fellow volunteer Irene Scher in acting as teacher, counselor and friend to the women. Despite their difficult circumstances (almost every girl has lost one or both parents due to malaria, HIV or insufficient medical care), they are all excited to learn. The volunteers work with them to write and the lost girls bring a new tradition to the Pathfinder Academy, to cast and launch a play about Wangari Maathai, the first women in Africa to win the Nobel Peace Prize for her tree planting efforts throughout Kenya.

Besides the 200 or so students who attend Pathfinder Academy, there are countless other kids who live, play and go to school in this area. It’s impossible to walk 10 feet down the dirt road without encountering pockets of little kids in school uniforms. It’s a scene that repeats itself almost every time Jen, Amanda, and Holly go for a walk or head to the local village to pick up bottled water, candy and, on one occasion a jumbo sized can of bug spray.

The kids out here are cute, but the insects in Kenya are killer.