The Ember Kenya Grandparents Empowerment Project is just what its name suggests: a grassroots effort to empower the grandparent caregivers of AIDS orphans to become self-sustaining for the sake of the children. This startup project in Funyula in the Busia District of west central Kenya near Lake Victoria intended to begin small and grow as it found funding to support further efforts. But the need was so great that the project’s founders have had to rethink their strategy.
At first, the project was only a theory in the doctoral dissertation of Robert Barasa, who graduated in June 2006 from the Garrett Theological Seminary in Evanston, Ill. While he was a student, he and his family attended Northminster Church in Evanston. Barasa, an Anglican priest, had graduated from the Presbyterian-founded Near East School of Theology in Beirut, Lebanon, and received an International Fellowship for one year of study at McCormick Seminary in Chicago where he earned a Master of Arts in Theological Studies. When he went to Funyula to conduct basic research and interviews for his dissertation, he was surprised at the interest he found. While he expected to interview perhaps 200 grandparents, more than 500 came to tell him their stories.
Back in the United States, Robert Barasa reached out to others who wanted to help, forming what ultimately became the Ember Kenya Advisory Board. Believing that The Ember Kenya Grandparents Project was not only needed, but that it could succeed, Northminster Church, which has been involved in other international efforts, took a leap of faith and contributed $35,000 to launch the project.
He came to understand that he was being called by God to implement the conclusion of his dissertation, that he could best help AIDS orphans by first working with their grandparent caregivers to upgrade their standard of living. The poverty of these people, many of whom had spent all their resources trying to help their dying children, pierced his heart. Many grandparents, still grieving, fell into despair at the prospect of having to start all over raising two, five, and even fourteen frightened grandchildren, when they had assumed that their own adult children would care for them in their old age. Just finding food every day was an overwhelming challenge, leaving families hungry, afraid, and ill.
Primarily a handful of Presbyterians, along with a Lutheran who had worked with Barasa in a Chicago family mental health clinic, the Ember Board began to brainstorm how they could help.
The first challenge was finding the money to fund the project for the first year. The Ember Kenya Project was conceived as a three-year effort to bring grandparents into small-businesses where they could support themselves and their grandchildren. By the end of year one, enrollees were to have identified a business for which they were suited. Year two would see the individual businesses grow and become sustainable. Year three would bring in local organizational partners, so the grandparents might continue their individual work while contributing to a community project for the benefit of all participants. The board would then evaluate the Ember Kenya Project to determine whether it should expand the project in Funyula with new enrollees or move to a new area to start over.
The needs of a startup project in another country posed more of a challenge than the small Advisory Board was equipped to meet, and a Chicago not-for-profit organization, Heartland Alliance International, agreed to handle logistics, such as money transfers to Kenya, helping to form a local Funyula Board of Directors so the project could become a legitimate non-governmental organization under the laws of Kenya. and providing supervision. Heartland, which oversees many large projects in the United States as well as in Iraq, Rwanda, and other African countries, became a vital partner in getting this grassroots effort off the ground.
When Barasa returned to Kenya in late spring 2006, word of the project had spread, and grandparents came and came and came, walking miles to be screened at the project office. More than 2,000 arrived that first month. Clearly the project could not handle that many. Strict screening procedures were set up, and volunteers from the community were trained to ascertain which potential participants would be most likely to succeed in the program. Ultimately, almost 1,000 participants were chosen. These grandparents are so motivated that they are well on their way to launching small business projects: soap-making, growing groundnuts for peanut butter production, raising domestic livestock, and much more. A seed has been planted in Kenya, and Christians have planted it.
Christians of other denominations are joining with Presbyterians to help fund this crucial and exciting work and make this a truly ecumenical effort. For more information on how you can help, please go to https://www.gettingtomaybe.com/ember.
Ruth Zekowski is a member of the advisory board of the Ember Kenya project and has visited the mission site in Kenya.
