A PASSSION BREWED FROM EXPERIENCE: THE STORY OF SAMSON ALUDA – Samson Aluda Inspirational Stories from life experience.
“I struggled in good measure to access secondary education. Not that accessing primary education was any better. My father had rejected me and my mother’s resources were limited. It’s my tussle that motivated me to make a difference in my community,” Samson Aluda begins.
Aluda, a mechanical engineer, teacher, husband, and father of two, is well known in Kibera for his philanthropy by virtue of the community-based school he started in 2009.
Samson Aluda Inspirational Stories feom Experience
His mother, a single parent trying to make ends meet, raised Aluda in Kibera with his six siblings in challenging circumstances. After securing a place in secondary school with much difficulty, he unfortunately had to drop out due to lack of school fees. After being out of school for a year, he approached Eutycus Secondary School, a community school in Kibera. At this school, with the promise of sourcing for bursary funds to facilitate his school fees, Aluda was given another chance to pursue his education.
Determined to prove himself and make his family proud, he excelled and attained an impeccable A minus in his KCSE.
Aluda was then admitted to Kenyatta University to pursue a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering. He effortlessly navigated his course while still showing up for his passion project, The Moonlight Centre School. He had established the school to accommodate students who would have otherwise not gotten the chance to join secondary school and would have instead immersed themselves into the abyss of vices such as crime, drugs, and prostitution.
“I was inspired to change the narrative for these children in my community. I approached a local church in Kibera with the appeal to have access to its service hall during weekdays. My contact at the church was kind enough to grant my request and so were my former high-school mates who volunteered their time as teachers and also donated books,” he explains.
“The school, however, gained traction when a programme dubbed ‘Step into the Slum’ run by Kiss 100 FM visited our school and put us in the limelight. This was in 2012 when I also applied for the One Young World initiative programme,” he adds.
One Young World is a London-based charity, founded in 2009 with the objective of bringing together young people from around the world and helping them make lasting connections to create positive change. In 2012 and 2013, as part of Kenya Power’s Corporate Social Investment programme, the Company sponsored 20 delegates to attend the One Young World annual summits in the United States of America and South Africa respectively. Aluda was sponsored by Kenya Power to both summits.
At the conferences, he got to debate and formulate solutions for the pressing issues the world faces, as well as share initiatives he was undertaking to change lives in his community.
His resilience and faith in what he does has been sustained over the years by his firm belief in God. “When I recite the Lord’s Prayer, I am faithful to the phrase: ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ It does not talk about tomorrow, rather, it talks about the present day, and that is where I am sustained, knowing that everyday carries its blessings.” he says.
Running The Moonlight Centre School has had its fair share of challenges for Aluda and his associates. He recalls days when students have gone without food and he has had to go to nearby schools to request for left-overs.
“Our first major breakthrough was when I walked with my colleagues to a nearby school to request for left-overs and we met the director of the First Love Initiative who came to learn of our food shortages. He has since provided us with ten sacks of maize and five sacks of beans every month, a true testament of the power I draw from the Lord’s Prayer when I ask for provision,” he happily says.
In 2019, through the networks he had established at the One Young World summits, Aluda was awarded a grant of Shs.1.2 million by the European Third World Association. “With these funds, we have moved out of rental rooms and have expanded the school by building more classrooms and adequate dormitories for the boarding students,” he says. Aditionaly, Kenya Power also gave him some funds to purchase books for the school’s library.
Aluda has never looked for a job since he graduated from university. He has remained true to his passion of changing the lives of slum children and he takes so much pride in seeing his students succeed.
“One of my former students has made it up the management ranks at Darling Hair Industries Kenya Ltd., and this kind of success is what fuels my enthusiasm that where hope was lost, a chance was given,” he beams.
Currently, Aluda and his associates are looking for a bigger parcel of land to set up a junior and senior high school. He will not just focus on the normal curriculum but also incorporate craft studies and hands-on abilities such as basic electronics, coding, cryptocurrency among others, as he believes these skills will give the students an edge in the competitive field.
He not only requests for financial support but requests those who are passionate about mentorship to consider contacting him for a school visit to counsel and mentor the students.
“This journey has not been easy, but the vision is well guided and my team and I are proud to be positively impacting these youthful lives,” he concludes.
In summary, the above narrative about Samson Aluda has been one of the inspirational stories to learn from life experience.
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