The purpose of The Kenya Initiative: from Street to School is to provide educational support to disadvantaged Kenya youth to help them overcome obstacles and reach their full potential. When they returned to Kingston, art gallery owner Raymond Vos had a conversation with them and learned of the relationships they had formed with some of the people they had encountered. Once aware of the situation
of these individuals, Ray was moved to begin art fundraisers to help provide for their educational and housing needs. He and his friends formed The Kenya Initiative: from Street to School. One of the individuals Ray heard about was John Njane. A former gang member, John was discovered by a benevolent couple in Kijabe and helped to turn his life around. He began to rescue homeless boys from the hard-living town of Mai Mahiu. These boys, aged 12-16, were largely orphans or abandoned children of town prostitutes, and were living on the streets. In 2012, John rented a house for them and began providing full-time care, including tutoring in basic literacy and math so the boys could enter school. The Kenya Initiative supported John and the boys from 2009 until 2018. Since the Initiative began, enough money was raised to enable twelve street boys to live with John and his family on a parcel of land donated by an American church. The boys were well fed and clothed and entered either in high school or learning a trade. Ray also learned about two young men living in the town of Kijabe. Isaac and Caleb worked at odd jobs and general labouring for the going rate of about $3 a day. Both boys were leaders in the community and strong students who had graduated from high school and wanted to attend university. But they had no prospects because their father died in 2007 of complications from chronic asthma. Their widowed mother Elizabeth, a teacher at a nearby elementary school, was unable to provide them with the opportunity to continue their education. The Kenya Initiative raised enough money to send Isaac and Caleb to Daystar University in Nairobi, Kenya. They have now graduated and have establishing their lives. The focus of educational support by the Kenya Initiative is now on sponsoring young boys and girls through primary, high school, college and university. Ray has now made four trips to Kenya himself, in 2013, 2016, 2018 and 2022 and has spent time with John and many of the students sponsored by the Kenya Initiative. During these trips, Ray also met a number of grandmothers that John is helping to support with food packages and guidance in farming practices. These widows are caring for grandchildren whose parents have died or are unable to support them. The Initiative contributes funds for food, medicine, and other necessities to help these families survive and, when possible, to enable some of these grandchildren to go to school. Our Motivation: True religion, according to the biblical book of St. James, means to take care of widows and orphans. If that is so, then Kenya is a place where true religion is desperately needed. John Njane knows what true religion means. He has remarkable passion, energy, and commitment to help his people in Kenya. Formerly he worked repairing small engines, often using his own income to help others. Now all his time is spent in enabling and overseeing the support efforts for young people and grandmothers. An American administrator at a mission school in Kijabe who has worked with John has remarked about him, “There is simply no one else like him here. His reputation is spotless.” When Raymond Vos first found out about Isaac & Caleb and the work John Njane was doing, it broke his heart. He believes compassion is love that is practical, and he realized that he could use his business as a vehicle to raise money and genuinely make a difference. Helping others to come into their potential, to give them a future and a hope is what moves his heart. By purchasing the photographs on display at Gallery Raymond, you will be helping provide education for young girls and boys. You will help give them a hopeful future by providing the care and education they need. You will also be assisting the families of these young people, including grandmothers caring for their orphaned or abandoned grandchildren. And that’s true religion.
