Dear Akelo nyar Kager,

Greetings from Nyikang Educational Trust Fund in Nairobi.

As a follow up to our brief meeting on Friday, 19th February, 2010 at the Fairview Hotel, I would like to commend the good job you are doing with children all across the world. I would also like to take this opportunity to introduce ourselves to you and your organization.

Nyikang Educational Trust Fund is a registered Philanthropy established by a network of professionals in Kenya and in the Diaspora to promote education-in its broadest scope-as a catalyst for development and social rejuvenation in Nyanza. Founded in May 2008, Nyikang Educational Trust Fund is the first indigenous fund of its kind, devoting resources to the prioritization of education as a strategic link to poverty eradication in Nyanza. The trust intends to do this by primarily tapping into the intellectual and resource capacity that already exists among the community members and their friends in Kenya, the extensive diaspora network around the world, and the professional experience and passion of the Nyikang Team.

Nyikang Educational Trust Fund departs from local traditional approaches to poverty eradication and instead borrows from what certain communities have done for years – harnessing the power from within by uniting to make a change.

The Educational Trust Fund seeks to work with a network of enlightened individual philanthropists, public institutions, effective nonprofit organizations, the private sector, media, skilled professional advisers and experienced community leaders, to promote social justice, increased opportunity, eradication of retrogressive traditions, and a better community for future generations.

Nyikang Educational Trust Fund’s approach to philanthropy is to harness the financial and human resource capacity in Kenya and in the Diaspora, friends and partners and to strategically direct these resources to educational interventions that will catalyze immediate and longer term economic and social-cultural development. Nyikang Educational Trust Fund brings together some of the best minds from the region, with the trustees bringing to the Organization extensive and diverse expertise in Academia, Law, Education, Business, Development and Corporate Management. And what’s more, 80% of the team is made up of women who are already transforming their world in careers and social engagement.

Nyikang Educational Trust Fund’s strategy seeks to pursue education as a critical strategic link to poverty eradication in Nyanza. The Educational Trust Fund has identified four strategic areas of focus and consequently established four corresponding programs that would serve as entry points for catalyzing change towards addressing poverty. The four areas are; Formal education, Cultural education, Economic education, and Local Governance/Civic education.
Through this, Nyikang Educational Trust Fund intends to achieve its objectives in the following ways;
1. Formal education – Education for Academic Excellence

a) Offer scholarships sponsorships for post secondary graduates to attend university and other tertiary institutions to pursue academic programs both locally and abroad. The scholarships will be awarded on merit and need and will follow a rigorous selection process. Sponsorship for particular secondary schools under special circumstances. The sponsorship for secondary education will be partial and on cost sharing basis with families/communities concerned.

b) Developing a mechanism that will facilitate and support the establishment of a prize system in schools for excelling students. This will act as an incentive package to individual students excelling in primary and secondary schools. In addition, Nyikang Educational Trust Fund will offer institutional support to selected learning centers and schools in the region.

2. Economic Education and support

Working with young people, women and special cases through the provision of mentorship and apprenticeship programs, and where necessary,material and financial support. The objective is to enable transitional support between formal education, career placement and business innovation. Nyikang Educational Trust Fund will support the establishment of strategic educational programs for strategic partnership with donor agencies, micro-finance institutions, the media, agricultural institutions and the private sector. The aim of this program is for education to impart knowledge and skills in various productive sectors for longer term community sustainability. The economic component will work in partnership with existing initiatives to promote sustainable income generation activities in the community through sound agricultural practices and entrepreneurship philosophies.

3. Social Cultural Education
Addressing cultural barriers to development through education that targets retrogressive cultures while encouraging positive community practices.
4. Local Governance / civic Education

This education is aimed at encouraging and strengthening local leadership institutions within government, local authorities and community levels. It’s mainly aimed at community elders’ groups, municipal councils, chiefs and other administrative organs at community levels. The aim is to improve the knowledge and capacity of these institutions to implement projects and motivate the community in developing areas.

Since inception we have engaged in a number projects, the most notable being in the economic education and support programs, where we have trained local community entrepreneurs on basic business management skills as well as helping in building their capacity in this area. The trainings that we have held so far have been successful and well received. However, in order to have a wider impact and reach out to the a larger number of the population, there is need for scaling up this initiative through partnering with major players within and beyond the sector. Therefore, for this reasons, Nyikang Educational Trust Fund requests for an opportunity to partner with your organization, in its bid to educate the population to make them self reliant and eradicate poverty in the process.
Kindly do let us know if you our proposal is viable and if we could forge a partnership with your organization to fight poverty in Nyanza. Do not hesitate to get in touch with the undersigned for additional information or clarification on any of the issues discussed above. I look forward to hearing from you .

Thanks and best regards,

Oscar Onguru,
Program Co-ordinator,
Nyikang Trust Fund,
Fort Granite Building,
Bishops Road (Directly behind Chancery Building),
Block C, Door 1
P. O. Box 06, Village Market,
Nairobi, Kenya
Tel : +254-020- 2055002

www.nyikang.org