News - Page 67 of 92 - Friends of Ngong Road

November 16, 2017 By Lacey Kraft Leave a Comment

2017 Annual Gathering Recap

This year’s Annual Gathering, themed “Ready, Willing & Able”, was held at Surly Brewery on Monday, November 13. It was a huge success thanks to the many who came to hear an update on the program, and the success of the students, and meet Maureen Mulievi, Ngong Road Children’s Foundation Program Director who was visiting from Nairobi.

Paula Meyer, Friends of Ngong Road Founder and President, highlighted the success of the first ten years of the organization that is proven through the organization’s own data. After post-secondary education, 91% of students find employment or internships, moving towards full-time work.

Kenya’s employment rate is around 60%, while first-time young adult workers face just 15% employment opportunity. Paula noted that this organization is “Ready” to continue transforming lives going forward.

Maureen Mulievi, Program Director in Kenya, then shared about her background growing up in rural Kenya in a large family. Her father was a teacher and farmer and believed in educating girls. At the time, the popular belief in the rural community was that educating a girl was a wasted investment as the girl would marry young and only enhance the new spouse’s family, not her own.

Finally, Evan and Meghan Feige, young professionals from the Twin Cities, talked about their experience launching a pilot life skills program in Kenya In January 2017. They plan to return to Kenya in January 2018 to launch a comprehensive life skills program for all secondary students and recent graduates with the support of Rotary International.

As always, the gathering was a reminder that the mission of transforming lives is only possible because of the committed and diverse community of people who care about providing access to education for children who otherwise would not have a chance.

If you did not get to attend the event, we invite you to listen to the Illumini Podcast produced by longtime volunteer, Steve Kotvis.

Steve has interviewed Paula and Maureen and intends to release a third interview with the Feiges. This will provide individuals who were unable to attend the Annual Gathering with a more comprehensive understanding of the discussions.

Listening is fun for anyone, whether they are new to or already familiar with the organization. Go ahead and check it out!

October 22, 2017 By Lacey Kraft 1 Comment

Meyer Wins the “Friend of the Community” African Award

We are proud to announce that this year’s Mshale “Friend of the Community” African Award winner is our founder and president, Paula Meyer. Thank you to everyone who texted to vote and to the African Awards community! It is well deserved for the work Paula has done to give over 500 children the opportunity to transform their lives through education.

African Awards, were launched in 2008, and presented annually by Mshale newspaper. Founded in 1996 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Mshale Newspaper prides itself as the voice of the African immigrant community in the Midwest and around the United States.

Award Nomination Narrative (Used to “Pitch” for the Award)
Paula Meyer is a leader people follow enthusiastically and unquestioningly while considering themselves lucky to be in her orbit. In 2007 Meyer founded Friends of Ngong Road (FONR) with the mission to provide education and support to children living in poverty in Kenya so they can transform their lives. Meyer retired early from her successful corporate career, dedicated the next chapter of her life’s work to helping children in Kenya, and has not looked back. Today over 500 Kenyan children have had the chance at an education they otherwise would not.

Meyer advocates for social justice and has impeccable integrity. She is extraordinarily compassionate with one of the most remarkable and infectious, big laughs. One of the first women to serve as finance chair of a major U.S. Senate campaign, Meyer earned her M.B.A. from Wharton Business School. She rose to senior positions at Ameriprise and now serves on corporate boards in the financial sector. She is a passionate advocate for Kenyan children and families, promoting humility, egalitarianism, and transforming lives through a program’s impact.

Meyer’s unique contribution is that she brings her business acumen to problem-solving, a determination to use metrics and evidence to guide decision-making, and a drive to work toward worthwhile and achievable goals. Under her leadership, educational milestones are monitored to best support student success toward employment:

8th-grade exam: for the past eight years, Friends of Ngong Road students have outperformed their Kenyan peers, granting them admission to higher-quality high schools.
High school transition: Friends of Ngong Road students transition at rates higher than 92 percent versus 63 percent in Kenya at large.
High school graduation: more than 95 percent of Friends of Ngong Road students successfully graduate.
Employment: 91 percent of Friends of Ngong Road post-secondary graduates have jobs or internships that may lead to employment.

In 2017, a new alumni caseworker was hired to support Meyer’s immediate goal for 75% of graduates to be gainfully employed by 2018. Her exceptional integrity, vision, positivity, and charisma are the magic glue that has built FoNR and will continue to support the Kenyan community FoNR supports.

Meyer has helped teach people to fish rather than giving them fish, enabling them to be agents of transformation in their communities. The wrap-around services and deep emotional connections among board members, sponsors, caseworkers, graduates, and students creates extraordinary success. Winning this award would enable Meyer and FONR to not just sustain the work and help start bringing it to scale, but demonstrate to others that we have the collective capacity to solve the most intractable worldwide problems. The children of Kenya in the program radiate the most capacious hope. What a gift to the world in these troubled times.

September 27, 2017 By Lacey Kraft Leave a Comment

Letter from Paula

Dear Friends,

Dr. Izabela Steflja, professor of Global Development at Tulane University, attended camp 2017. I spoke to a couple of Dr. Steflja’s classes at Tulane in April and at that time we began a conversation that I believe is going to yield deep insights for Friends of Ngong Road. For ten years we have been collecting data about the program using SalesForce.com. We are beginning to mine that data and the results are very encouraging. Our analyses tell us that the program is yielding strong, positive results – in academics and ultimately in employment.

However, we want to understand not just what our results have been but why we have achieved the results. Dr. Steflja designed an interview questionnaire and conducted in-depth qualitative interviews with 35 secondary and post-secondary students from the program during her recent time in Kenya. In a future publication, we will share both our results and our findings as to why we have achieved them.

For now, I would like to share a story with you about a question Dr. Steflja threw into the interview at the last minute. She asked each person, “If you were rich, what would you do with the money?” The thing that struck her as unique about the responses is that 100% of respondents answered the same way. Every student she interviewed said that if they were rich, they would sponsor as many children as they could possibly afford.

She explained to me that among children in the program, the definition of rich is someone who can afford to help children they are not related to. For sponsored children, one of the magical things about having a sponsor is that sponsors are rich enough to help children they don’t even know. For our children, that is the definition of wealth.

Imagine – 100% of those interviewed answered the same way.

What would you do if you were rich? For children in this program, you are rich! Thank you for sharing your wealth with them. We hope that sharing your wealth has given you a rich and enjoyable experience.

You are making a difference. Thank you for all you do.

Paula Meyer
President