A Hands-On Education
In Kenya, students learn business management by working in a microfinance program alongside its women entrepreneurs.
While she’s still in high school, Faith Gichuru has an impressive title: chair of the board. As a student at Mount Kenya Academy, a partner institution of First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta, she is learning the ins and outs of business management while working with and overseeing the ventures of a group of women in a microfinance program fueled by First Presbyterian.
The relationship between the students and the entrepreneurial women has been valuable on both sides.
Through direct involvement with the business owners, “we have been able to implement much [of what] we learn in our classrooms into the real world,” Gichuru said, “thus giving us a better understanding of how the world works. It has also imparted skills that we can use in the future.” Nelson Mandela saw the possibilities when he said, “The power of education extends beyond the development of skills we need for economic success. It can contribute to nation-building and reconciliation.”
In 2010, the Kenya Committee of First Presbyterian, which had been active in East Africa since 1995, decided to look into microfinance as a way to help the women of a partner congregation, Chaka Presbyterian Church, to establish businesses that support their families. Committee members an ocean away believed they needed on-site management for the program. In talking with their friends, who headed Mount Kenya Academy, they found their solution. The academy, founded in 1982 in Nyeri township in the central highlands of Kenya, had added a senior school in 2004. The Atlantans thought the academy’s students could learn by doing, under the supervision of academy officials, while also becoming more familiar with the conditions of the area around them.
“We saw that this would be a great tool for teaching the kids all about money, and about the needs of people in the community and what they can do,” said Cindy Candler, a First Presbyterian member and a founder of the Kenya partnership. The students formed their own board with some adult faculty members of the school. Together they review funding requests and oversee business operations.
Thirty women entrepreneurs received the first small loans. One woman used her loan to buy an awning so that fabrics wouldn’t fade under the sun in the marketplace. Others have raised livestock, sold beauty products, and even operated a quarry. Under the philosophy of microfinance, as recipients pay back their low-interest loans, the money is recirculated to other recipients.
The program has expanded to a second Kenyan congregation. Currently, twenty-four women from the Chaka church and eighteen women from Kirathimo, the second congregation, have received loans. In the history of the program, Candler said, no recipient has ever defaulted.
Over seventy students from Mount Kenya Academy have been involved in the microfinance program. They do the bookkeeping and auditing for the overall program, and during nonpandemic times, they host occasional conferences and visit each participant at least monthly.
“Women and youth have been very active in running very lucrative businesses that support their families, their communities, and the economy of the nation. The microfinance programs that are supported by the First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta are a testimony to this fact.”
BEN YEBEI, HEAD OF FINANCIAL SERVICES, MOUNT KENYA ACADEMY
Joseph Ritho, student board chairman in 2017, said he gained “practical insights on how loans work and the importance of credit in enterprise.” The microfinance program “has reached into the segment of the economy that is usually overlooked by big finance: women in the informal sector of the economy,” he said. “It is, therefore, akin to the metaphorical killing two birds with one stone as it bridges the gender and informal sector gap in relation to accessing good reliable credit.”
Now a student in computer science at the University of Nairobi, Ritho said, “I am appreciating more the entrepreneurial skills I learned from the program. I understand the role of credit in start-up development at a greater insight.”
Students not only learn about profits and losses but also about philanthropy. “A lot of these students come from middle-class families,” said Candler. “They need to learn, just like our kids do, that not everybody has food on the table.”
A team from First Presbyterian Church checked out microfinance businesses and met with the students helping to oversee the program.
Students say that working with the entrepreneurs has made a difference in how they see the world. “Meeting women who were ambitious enough to escape poverty by going above and beyond their current situations resonated with me as I wanted better for myself,” said Chris Wanyondu, class of 2012. “I took many lessons from this experience, the most crucial being that I should always be ready to be called upon to serve. I also learned the importance of being able to talk about money matters even with friends, as we learn from others just as they learn from us.”
Dennis Wambugu, class of 2018, said he learned the importance of “giving back to the community.” Now a student at the university, he heads a group called Royal Compassionates, which helps street children.
Magdalene Muthoni, class of 2012, said she was timid at first about speaking with the entrepreneurs. “What possibly could we teach them?” she asked. “However, we quickly learned they were open-minded and eager to learn. The women were honest and would share their successes and struggles.“
Muthoni said she believes the microfinance program had a huge impact “on how the women handled their business, on our confidence as students, and on the financiers in uplifting the community, one woman at a time.”
The microfinance program in Kenya has been a “game changer” not only for individuals but for communities, said Ben Yebei, the head of financial services on staff at Mount Kenya Academy. “Women and youth have been very active in running very lucrative businesses that support their families, their communities, and the economy of the nation,” he said. “The microfinance programs that are supported by the First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta are a testimony to this fact. Our students have an opportunity to put into practice what they are learning in class. The students learn and appreciate the need to support those who are needy in our communities. Several of our graduates are impacting various communities in our nation.”
“Meeting women who were ambitious enough to escape poverty by going above and beyond their current situations resonated with me as I wanted better for myself.”
CHRIS WANYONDU, CLASS OF 2012
Students have been able to participate as the women stabilize their incomes and save for the future while paying for food, shelter, medical needs, and their children’s education, said Max Austin Ngige, 2020 student board chair. Meanwhile, he has seen the difference economic opportunity can make. “I look forward to pursuing business as a career in order to bring positive change to the economy of my country,” he said.
Through work with the microfinance program, students at Mount Kenya Academy are not only learning to manage money, but they are seeing the difference money can make to establish the foundations for success for those who have had little of it.
