About Us
Kisumu Children is dedicated to improving the lives of some of Kenya’s poorest children by supporting children within their own homes, providing daily lunches to the poorest children in the community, offering emergency care for children at risk, and a broader, longer-term strategy of community development.
The Cherry Brierley Children’s Home (CBCH), has existed since 1995, starting with a few desperate children taken in by a Kenyan pastor and his wife. It grew to become a 72 bed Home, but in 2020, when the Covid-19 Pandemic struck, the Kenyan Government introduced the Alternative Family Care programme, which insisted that all children leave such Homes and return to any surviving family they have in their community regardless of means. The children were sent away, and CBCH has since adapted into a hub for greater community involvement.
The Home still provides a safe haven for children at immediate risk sent to us by the Children’s Department, but now, instead of our other children living at the Home, they, and many more besides, come to us each day for a nutritious lunch, clean water, clothing, and medical care, all within a loving, Christian environment.
Our current focus
The care of 110 sponsored children with food, education, medical care etc. Caring residentially for a few children at immediate risk sent to us by the Children’s Department Lobbying the new Government to amend the AFC programme to allow successful Children’s Homes to be residential again Using The Cherry Brierley Children’s Home as a teaching hub transforming lives through information and training by educating the community on issues such as healthcare, parenting skills, AIDS, agriculture, IT and business startup skills. The daily lunch programme for children at risk in the community, up to 150 lunches per day Our Social Worker, Pamela, visits family homes to understand more individual needs to raise awareness for support Ongoing infrastructure development projects for the community and schools A fundraising focus on Sponsorships to help our supporters connect more personally with children and families Growing vegetables on a nearby plot of land owned by the charity to support the lunch programme
All of our sponsored children receive primary education, going on to secondary education, apprenticeships, vocational training, college or university as appropriate. Education is a crucial step to self-sufficiency.
Kisumu Children’s projects are run by dedicated local Christian Kenyan staff.
Where is Kisumu?
The difference it makes
We’re helping our children achieve their best at school!
In Kenya, the Kisumu Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) test takes place at the end of Primary School (typically 14 years old). Our graph here shows that our cared-for children, with our love and support, are achieving better KCPE grades over time.
Making the Most of Secondary Education
As an International Development Charity we understand that to help people in a sustainable way, we need to support them into a career so that they can break the poverty cycle themselves. The career pathways of our over-18s (to date) is shown below. These figures are significant, given these young people are some of the most deprived in an already poor district:
Vocational Training: 18
Employment (including self-employed/own business): 51
These three young women grew up in the Children’s Home. They have recently enrolled in higher education to study, respectively, Supply Chain Management, Land Surveying, and Technical Design.
and
From this…
…to this
Key Achievements and Future development projects at Tieng’re Primary School
On top of the full and ongoing support we provide to our current child and young adults, we have set ourselves key projects.
2019
✓ Build a protective 2m fence around Tieng’re Primary School to keep the children safe from outside interest
✓ Build a Borehole (100m depth)
✓ Certified clean drinking water
✓ Support of 10 extra under-privileged children through primary school and beyond
2020
✓ Build 4 new school classrooms
✓ Reduce Teacher/child ratio from 1:106 to 1:70
✓ Girls’ washroom
✓ Lay piping to the water tower at the school
✓ Support 20 further under-privileged children through primary school and beyond
✓ Establish and run Covid-19 Emergency Food Pack distribution to the local community
✓ Emergency daily feeding programme for 100 children at our Home
✓ Begin renovation of all classrooms at Tieng’re Primary School
2021
✓ Continue the Covid-19 Emergency Food Pack distribution to the local community
✓ Continue the Emergency daily feeding programme for 100 children at our Home (named the Emergency Kitchen)
✓ Establish a community garden to grow food to supply the Emergency Kitchen for children at risk of starvation
✓ 24 New toilet cubicles for 850 pupils (and their teachers)
2022
(these plans were pushed back to 2022 because of the immediate emergencies created by the Pandemic in 2020/21)
✓ Hire a qualified Social Worker to support families in the community
✓ Support an additional 10 under-privileged primary school children
✓ Kitchen equipment (now that the school have a kitchen for school meals)
2023
✓ Deliver Business Training courses at the Home for Community entrepreneurs to help them start small businesses for income generation
✓ Provide an employed Social Worker for community social care
- The provision of a support programme for Disabled Children in the local community
- Lay piping for school fields irrigation – for cultivation of school meal ingredients
- Support 20 further under-privileged children through primary school and beyond
