Education and mentorship are important attributes of growth of a society particularly for communities within the North Eastern Kenya. These communities are often faced with challenges of extreme poverty, marginalization and little exposure which affects their access to opportunities for education and academic growth.
In addition to this, these focus areas also have high levels of school dropout rates which places many youths on the streets without formal education and disheveled in their ambitions for a better life. It is important for us to address this gap and provide leadership and support for the youth and community members that are adversely affected in this regard.
This pillar therefore seeks to develop clarity about the nature of effective mentoring and coaching in order to secure coherence, excellence and a positive impact for vulnerable young people in our target areas. This attribute of the pillar seeks to promote mentoring and coaching as a core part of UWO capacity building in schools and in the community.
The pillar will also develop a widely understood and agreed set of principles that illustrate the characteristics of effective approaches to mentoring and coaching as a benchmark for UWO and other facilitators we work with.
Lastly, the pillar seeks to illustrate and, in so doing, seed the development of the skills and UWO activities that enable our interventions to use mentoring and coaching as a means of professional and school development; and community empowerment.