Teaching African girls to go far

The Rev. Henry Simaro used to flag down vans filled with Western tourists in hopes of collecting money to help children living in shanty towns near Nairobi, Kenya. Occasionally, the tourists would give him bottles of water for the children.

“That was good, because at least it was something,” Simaro said Tuesday.

The priest will visit Newport Beach this week in hopes of raising money to complete a new middle school for girls near Athi River, a settlement neighboring a cement factory about an hour outside of Nairobi.

With just $20 in his pocket, Simaro first visited Our Lady Queen of Angels Church in Newport Beach in 2005 in hopes the well-heeled congregation would give him money to build a well and help him buy a medical van to transport sick children.

Members of the congregation responded by forming African Child Foundation. The Newport Beach-based nonprofit hopes to raise about $1.4 million to build Mt. Olive Girls Middle School, which will house and educate Kenyan girls in need. More than $400,000 has been raised so far. The half-completed, two-level, brick school will open its doors for a limited number of students in January.

The group hopes to raise about $220,000 to help complete a third wing of the school, which will include a dormitory for students.

“It took my breath away when I saw the building being built — I was overwhelmed at what so little had built,” said Jene Meece, a volunteer with the African Child Foundation. Meece, a Newport Beach resident, visited the Mt. Olive site with a group of local women in May.

By helping impoverished girls through middle school, Simaro believes he is helping them through a critical time, when many young Kenyan girls drop out of school after they get pregnant or get married.

“The tricky part is to get them to high school,” Simaro said. “If you get them into high school, they can at least argue their case.”

In a little more than three years, Simaro has gathered about 400 children under his care. Many children in Athi River have lost their parents to the HIV/AIDS epidemic; others have been abandoned.

“The whole thing is based on the whole story that if you teach them to fish, you teach them how to feed themselves,” said Barry Baldwin, a board member of African Child Foundation.

Simaro hopes that by helping the children of Athi River, a few of them will also help others.

“The aim is to get them educated so they can go back and be agents of change,” he said.

How To Help

For more information on how to donate to African Child Foundation, visit www.africanchildfoundation.org.