Every morning, Veronica Kilola wakes up to do her routine household chores. She is a dometic worker and loves her work dearly.
But the 21-year-old mother also loves education, but until recently, had never stepped into a classroom.
She is now in nursery school, with ten classmates, at a Catholic
Church-sponsored nursery school in Taita-Taveta County.
The class is
full of childish babbling, but that does not detract Ms Kilola from the
ultimate prize—banishing ignorance and poverty from her life.
The woman from Mwatunge village in Mwatate sub-county is happy to be in school after failing to attain formal education earlier.
“I cannot withstand the shame of illiteracy any more,” explained
the mother of three.
“I have decided to go back to school because I
cannot communicate with my employer effectively in Kiswahili and
English.”
Speaking to The Standard at Lushangonyi Catholic Nursery School
in Wundanyi division, Kilola reveals that she uses part of her salary to
pay school fees and the rest to support herself, her children and
mother.
“I juggle between my work as a housegirl and my school work. I am
grateful to my employer for encouraging me to go back to school from
where I hope to move to the next level. I am progressing well with my
studies and hope to join Standard One next year.”
She adds: “All along I did not know how to read and write my name, but I am happy now that I can do so,” she says.
That Kilola is performing well in class is not an exaggeration.
Although she only enrolled in the school on October 22 this year, her
teacher, Pamela Maza, says she was ranked number one at the end of the
term, beating the ten other pupils in her class, who had been in school
for a whole year.
Standard
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