Kenya
Capital: Nairobi
Population: 37 million (43% 0-14 years)
Life expectancy: 55 years
HIV/AIDS prevalence: 6.7%
People Living with HIV/AIDS: 1.2 million
Official Language: English, Swahili
AOJ Kenya: Ministry began in 1990

The mission in Kenya began with a small sponsorship program, seeking to provide care for 9 orphans in the Mathare Valley, a slum in Nairobi. The Arms of Jesus Children's Mission now supports children in Greater Nairobi through partnership agreements with various local church and non-governmental organizations who administer the funds directed to children's homes and school sponsorhip programs.

Featured Partner

Kariobangi Baptist Youth Center/Highridge Academy

KBYC was started in 1984 by Pastor David Kiatu as a vocational training center, where unemployed youth were taught marketable skills such as woodwork for the boys and dressmaking for the girls. KBYC is located on reclaimed land which used to be a quarry right next to one of the biggest garbage dumps in greater Nairobi. In fact you can stand in the school yard and watch local entrepreneurs sorting through the garbage for plastic bags which they wash in a filthy stream so that they can sell them for a few pennies.

In 2002 Pastor Euticauls Wambua, a graduate of the KBYC trade school, returned to the center and along with Pastor Kiatu, started a non-formal elementary school - Highridge Baptist Academy. They started with just a few preschool-age children and added one new class each year, inducting new preschoolers while continuing to cater to the children already enrolled. The school now has facilities for baby through class 4 and there are 210 students enrolled. The youth center and the school operate on faith, with no government funding. When the funds run low, teachers are not paid and children have to survive without their lunch that is normally part of the program. It costs the school approximately $400.00 per month alone to maintain the lunch program. When I visited them recently, they had sufficient rice and beans to feed the children for 10 days and no more money to buy food after that.

Yet everyone at KBYC is content, confident that God will provide

If you feel called to support one of the children for whom the staff of KBYC/Highridge Academy are caring, please click "The Children" button and browse through the case files

The Arms of Jesus Children's Mission is pleased to sponsor Grace Wangare, one of the teachers at KBYC, click here to read her touching story.