Faith’s mama was given in marriage to a much older man when she was just 13. The bride price was six goats and local brew. The cost – her education, her childhood and she became a mother when she was just a child herself.

According to a Plan International study, in developing countries, one girl in seven is married by age 15; and 38% by age 18. Furthermore, medical complications from pregnancy are the leading cause of death among adolescent girls. In developing countries, when a girl receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children.

“Building an evidence base of effective programs that increase the age at marriage in sub-Saharan Africa” is a five-year program, funded by USAID, being implemented in East Africa, in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. These countries are identified to build an evidence base in East Africa and to explore how marriage age may be impacted in various settings, using different models. In Kenya, the program will be implemented by Strengthening Community Partnership & Empowerment (SCOPE) in Kilifi County, Coast Province. Four intervention strategies will be implemented in various combinations, to test the incremental effects of different interventions to delay marriage.

The intervention strategies for Kenya were developed collaboratively by Population Council and SCOPE, based on results from formative research in Vitengeni division of Kilifi district and Chonyi division of Ganze district.

“The main drivers of early marriage in these communities were identified as: teenage pregnancy, poverty, lack of education, school drop-out, and cultural factors,” according to Jasho Bomu, SCOPE Technical Director. “As a result, the intervention strategies will include community awareness, promotion of girls’ education and livelihoods, and an economic incentive.”

Implementation of the project will be within selected sub-locations in the divisions of Vitengeni, Chonyi, Bamba/Ganze, Kaloleni, and Magarini, and is targeted to reach about 500 girls and 100 families in each zone. Each zone will employ strategies that empower families so they do not give up their daughters to early marriage. Gladys Rehema Bomu, Programme Coordinator for the project, is currently recruiting mentors for the girls from the local communities. Business training will be provided to help households build sustainable livelihoods.

The goal will be to develop and implement culturally-appropriate programs to delay the age at marriage in Kilifi County. Specific objectives are:
• To increase awareness and education at the community level on the negative effects of early marriage;
• To promote girls’ education through the provision of educational subsidies;
• To provide girls social support to achieve their educational goals;
• To offset the economic gains made in marriage transactions through the provision of community incentives.

SCOPE’s implementation phase will span two years, beginning in 2012. “It is our intention to identify the best practices to delay early marriage in this project and to make those sustainable after the grant ends throughout Kilifi County so our girls can have a hope for a better future,” said Bomu.

While the law requires children to be in school, poverty and family circumstances force many children into child labour schemes at the expense of their education, health and safety, and their childhood.

SCOPE has partnered with the International Labour Organization (ILO) in a program to prevent and withdraw children from child labour through community empowerment in Kilifi Central Location. The two-year project, which began in June, is well underway in five primary and two secondary schools where there is a high incidence of children who are either regularly absent or are dropping out of school because they are working.

“What constitutes child labour varies based on the age of the child,” said Jasho Bomu, Technical Director for SCOPE, “however, with this project SCOPE and ILO hope to create sustainable changes in families’ lives and in education programs that provide children and their families with opportunities that will end the practice of child labour that results from poverty.”

SCOPE staff began implementation of the project with the formation of a District Child Labour Committee (DCLC) and five Local Child Labour Committees (LCLC); one for each school in the program. Made up of community leaders, school officials, teachers and other volunteers, the LCLC helps with sensitization of the parents and children to child labour issues.

“The program incorporates SCOPE’s SMART Youth Clubs that will be used to create awareness on issues of child labour and children rights within the school and outside the school community” according to Program Coordinator Rodah Ngaira. “The members will act as ambassadors in this fight of making Kilifi a child labour free zone.”

SCOPE will be conducting business training through SCOPE’s Business Development Services (BDS) for families so that they might improve their livelihood, eliminating the need to rely on their children to bring in additional income. Business training through BDS will also be offered to the young people to help them identify better economic opportunities and sustainable livelihoods.

Moving the Goalposts (www.mtgk.org) and Solidarity with Women in Distress (SOLWODI www.solwodi.de) are also collaborating in the project.

CHILD LABOUR refers to work undertaken by children aged between 5 and 17 that prevents them from attending school, is exploitative, hazardous, or inappropriate for their age. Children ages 16-17 are legally able to work in Kenya; however they are protected from working under hazardous conditions or the Worst Forms of Child Labour (WFCL). WFCL includes slavery, prostitution, forced or compulsory labour, involvement in illicit activities, and forced recruitment for use in armed conflict.

The law does not prohibit child work, defined as certain types of light work undertaken by children such as helping in household chores and in farms, provided the work is performed outside schools hours and it does not interfere with their schooling, and physical and moral development.

Children involved in illegal child labour activities will be removed from the workplace, provided appropriate rehabilitation services and reintegrated into a decent life and age-appropriate education or vocational training.

The schools and the communities have received the project positively. “Our prayers have been answered and are we willing to support the program to the end,” said the head teacher of Soyosoyo “I had given up the fight because I thought the battle was mine alone but with the help of the organization and the LCLC the community we serve will change.

She is the first student in a new project being launched by Strengthening Community Empowerment and Partnership (SCOPE).

“The Mentorship Project” is a SCOPE initiative which is geared towards bringing volunteers and interns with different professions and expertise from different fields to enhance cultural sensitivity and family management issues at household level as well as community level.
“In addition to giving the student real social engagement at the village level, the program was conceived to influence positive change for the host family, to help children with their education and provide a positive role model for the family,” according to Jasho Bomu, Technical Director and co-founder of SCOPE.

The volunteer may also help the family improve their business practices and financial literacy to establish more successful income generating activities.

When she first arrived in Vitengeni for her three month commitment, Sylvia wondered how she would survive. “The compound was filthy, the kids were shoe-less and dirty, and meals were limited to umena and ugali, not enough nutrition for growing children,” she said. Family and friends helped scrub the compound clean and a new toilet was constructed.

Sylvia taught basic nutrition, as well as new recipes that added fruits and vegetables to their diet. In addition to helping the seven children with their studies, she has taught the family about hygiene and health issues, such as HIV/AIDs, STDs and sexual issues.

“They accepted me as their own,” she says, “and I will be sad to leave. While they have very little, they find joy in every day.” says Sylvia P.

SCOPE has 36 families in the district who would welcome a student volunteer for a minimum three-moth commitment. Volunteers pay a nominal fee to help offset the host family costs of feeding and housing the student, as well as SCOPE administrative costs. For additional information visit the SCOPE website, www.scopekenya.org.

Our new site is packed full of information on how SCOPE was set up, detailing our work, why our work is required and where we work.  The site is complete with some excellent photos documenting some of our work.

In addition, we will also be regularly updating the site detailing some of the latest activities we’ve carried out in the fields we operate.  The site now also allows you to follow us via Twitter and Facebook as well a grabbing our RSS feed.

You can also find out how you can get involved in our work and support our community.  More?  We’ve added some information about Kilifi and how and why you should come and visit us!

If you have any feedback on our website, we’d very much your welcome your thoughts.  Click here to contact us.

Home Testing allows SCOPE’s Trained Voluntary Testing and Counseling (VCT) team to visit households and test entire families at their home.  Since we begun this program, we have tested over 2000 people in homes across our district.  This is a fantastic result and there are many additional benefits to this approach, including:

• Greater access to VCT within the community:  Within many communities, there is a terrible stigma related to entering a VCT center for testing which proves an obstacle to many ‘Kilifians’ getting tested.  However, by meeting a family in their home, this obstacle is removed and more people are willing to find out their status – a crucial step in the fight against HIV/AIDS.
• Entire families get tested: This particularly important  where one spouse is positive, there is an increase chance that other family members are infected also.  The earlier you find out that you are positive, the quicker you get access to health services and therefore, gives you a great chance to live positively with your virus.  As Mrema says “being positive is not the end”.
• Providing information to the family on how to stay protected: In addition to counseling and testing,  Community Health Workers can also provide the family with additional health information regarding HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria to help keep the family healthy.
• Counseling and support: Finding out that your positive can be an extremely traumatic event in your life. Our trained home testing counselors helps community members cope with the news and illustrates how infected can maintain healthy and live a long life even though they are infected.  In a family environment, the counselor can include the entire family and they can work together as a unit, solidifying the family bond.

SCOPE work closely with SCOPE trained Peer Educators, Ministry of Health Officials and of course, SCOPEs Food Distribution team to maximise our impact and penetration within our communities.  This joint approach is without doubt one of the main reasons for our success.

Read about how Mzee Kitsao and his family got tested at their home in Ngerenya in Bahari Division, Kilifi.