Sponsorship
Ten percent of Kenyan children grow up as orphans. This is, amongst other causes, due to high HIV rates in the East African country. The orphans often live with close relatives or with other children who are deprived of a family and take care of each other. In many cases their substitute families cannot afford school fees or basic school equipment and the children have to work in order to support the family. Through a sponsorship, you can give a parentless child in Kenya a new, better future.
The support of your sponsorship will reach and affect a child directly:
- With each sponsorship, a child can attend school or complete an apprenticeship.
- Your sponsored child has the chance to grow up to be healthy, educated and have a perspective for the future.
- With your financial support you actively prevent child labor.
“After my parents died, I lived with my sick grandmother at my uncle’s home with his three children. There was no money for school. On many days my uncle couldn’t even afford food for all of us. But I was lucky: Thanks to the help of Dentists for Africa and my godmother, I was able to go to school at the age of six. Today I am studying pharmacy at Mount Kenya University. My uncle now has a permanent job, can look after his children and provide my grandmother with medication. My dream is to open my own pharmacy and thus help other people and offer jobs.”
Gervas Pulcheria Kavishe, 20 years
What sets a DfA-Sponsorship apart?
Absolute Transparency
The sisters of the Franciscan Order of St. Joseph and our DfA Kenya team guarantee you, as our local project partners, that your financial support will be used in a clearly traceable manner. We ensure that the funds are used exclusively for your sponsored child. You will receive an individual statement three times a year detailing the measures taken and the costs incurred. All expenses are documented with original receipts. Typical items include school fees and living expenses, as well as smaller amounts for school uniforms, books and notebooks.
Personal Contact
Who doesn’t enjoy receiving mail? In order to keep track of the development and the career of your sponsored child, we offer direct and personal letter correspondence. Furthermore, we organize trips for sponsors to visit Kenya at regular intervals. Together with other sponsors you can get to know the country and get in personal contact with your sponsored child.
Support where it is needed the most
The local people know best how they can be helped and who needs support. All our projects are based on this principle. We have also been working with local partners in the sponsorship project since the beginning. While our DfA Kenya team coordinates the project, a committee from the St. Monica Village widows’ cooperative selects the orphans. They know the families in the Kisumu region, where our association is particularly active, and know who needs outside help.
For the children who are waiting for a sponsor from Germany, the costs are currently borne by our association. Some of them are already going to school. Others will start going to school with the beginning of the sponsorship. Children in Kenya attend primary school for eight years. Then they either do a three-year apprenticeship or they go to secondary school for four more years. This is followed by a three- to four-year college or university education.
The aim of the sponsorships is to provide access to high-quality education and vocational training for children and young people from poor backgrounds in Kenya. This is the only way for them to find employment or to become self-employed later on.
If possible, we send the children to boarding schools, where they can learn and live in a quiet environment, without having to work for their family. Our partners manage the project on site and maintain direct contact with the children. This is how we ensure that the children are always well looked after. With a good education and vocational training, the children get a perspective and the chance for a better future.
What are the Costs for a Sponsorship?
As a sponsor, you bear the individual costs that arise for your sponsored child. These vary between 400 and 650 euros per year depending on the age group of the child.
Three possible Modules for a Sponsorship:
Module 1
Assuming a sponsorship with an annual amount of 400 euros for school education (around 33 euros per month) or 500 euros for vocational training (around 42 euros per month). Any additional costs for your sponsored child will be covered by the organization.
Module 2
Assuming a sponsorship with a maximum annual amount of up to 650 euros, which includes the costs for attending boarding school. This corresponds to about 54 euros a month.
Module 3
Assuming a sponsorship with the actual costs incurred (individual arrangements).
After every donation, a confirmation of donation will be sent to you with the billing. If your donation is monthly, you will receive the confirmation once a year.
Our Sustainable Support: Success Stories from the Sponsorship Project
A young doctor from Nakuru in Western Kenya reports how he got the chance of a lifetime thanks to Dentist for Africa:
“I was very lucky and the help I had been hoping for for so long came after all: the Dentist for Africa orphan project took me in and Christel Hainer became my godmother. She was ready to support me during my high school education. At first, I couldn’t believe it! A great burden had been taken off my family. From now on I was no longer sent home from school because the fees had not been paid or I did not have a proper school uniform. It was a time of happiness and peace. In 2012 I graduated and applied to DfA for a scholarship in order to study medicine. My dream came true again: The Walter-Gastreich Foundation supported me and I was able to enroll at the Kenya Methodist University. Today I can work as a doctor in my home community.”
Support your own success story now
Mark Wekesa studies dentistry at the University of Nairobi.
“It was a radical turning point for me when DfA came into my life” reports the 23-year-old. “In my childhood, nobody would have thought that I would make it this far. I grew up in a rural area in western Kenya and was raised by my grandmother after my mother died. Thanks to the support by my sponsors and ofDfA, I was able to finish secondary school with good grades. At a DfA career counseling seminar I was then asked if I was interested in studying dentistry. I immediately said yes! When I graduate in 2025, I want to help improve dentistry in East Africa and also treat patients who cannot afford it.”
What is the Duration of a Sponsorship at DfA?
The sponsorship begins as soon as you have signed and sent back your declaration of consent and it ends as soon as your sponsored child has completed vocational training or college. The duration of your sponsorship thus depends on your child’s educational status and future development.
If you want to terminate the sponsorship you can contact us at any time, and we will find a solution together.
How does DfA Ensure That your Donation Gets Directly to Your Child?
The sponsorship fee is managed by our sponsorship team in Kenya. This team is already strongly integrated into the children’s lives before the beginning of the sponsorship. Sr. Seraphine, manager of the program since 2007, and her staff, collect information on family relationships and pay the school fees directly to the schools. The team also transfers the contributions for health insurance and the sponsors payments. They then send all documents to our office in Weimar. This is where the accounting for our sponsors is done.
The sponsorship team also meets the children several times every year during their holidays to clarify important questions about school education and sponsorship. The children personally come to our office in Nyabondo to hand in their certificates and letters that they write to their sponsors. In the office, they are offered career counseling and guidance. Sr. Seraphine knows every single child personally and attentively accompanies their development.
You may find a detailed list of our expenses in our annual reports. Click here for the 2022 annual report. You can find all other reports on our press page.
Our association attaches great importance to transparency and has therefore joined the Transparent Civil Society Initiative. In this context, we always provide the most important information about our work in our self-commitment.
The sponsorship team also meets the children several times a year during the school vacations to clarify important questions about school education and sponsorship. The children then come in person to the DfA office in Nyabondo to hand in their school reports and letters, which they write to their sponsors. They are also offered careers advice there. Sr. Seraphine knows each of the children personally and closely follows their development.
Should you wish to end the sponsorship prematurely, you can contact us at any time and we will find a solution together.
Your Path to a Sponsorship
- Orphans: A committee made up of widows and Franciscans select those children, who are in need the most, for the admission to our project.
- Establishing contact: You ask us for further information, and we make a suggestion for a child that needs your sponsorship.
- Declaration of consent: You send us your written consent for the sponsorship, which will exist from this moment on.
- Contact: Your sponsored child will be informed about the sponsorship and you can start exchanging letters. Visiting the child is possible as part of a sponsorship trip.
- New opportunities: Your sponsored child can now go to boarding school or complete an apprenticeship, while in a safe and stable environment. This provides the child with the opportunity to build a better life for him- or herself.
Further information and Suggestion for your Sponsorship
If you are interested in becoming a sponsor, please fill in the contact form below. We will then contact you and provide you with further information as well as a suggestion for a suitable child.
Background of the project
36 percent of the population in Kenya live below the poverty line. Due to the low life expectancy, which is partly due to the high AIDS rate in some regions, many children grow up without their parents. They are not adequately cared for and often receive insufficient schooling. Growing up in poverty deprives them of a self-determined future.
In the Kisumu region, the AIDS rate is close to 20 percent. Orphans grow up with relatives who often barely have the means to feed their own children, let alone for sending them to school. A poor state of health and the consequences of poverty limit the children’s productivity. Dentists for Africa is committed to providing good care for these children through our sponsorship project.