Orbit Village Project

The Orbit Village Project is a non-profit organization that comprises a school (Kindergarten through Primary-Secondary), a children’s home, community development programs, and a church. Orbit  helps people in crisis, rescues children, keeps families together, educates, feeds, strengthens, rehabilitates, and employs the most marginalized groups in Kenya. Orbit offers education to over 500 students, home-based food support to over 80 families, employs 50+ locals, and operates 3 greenhouses in order to raise food and transfer essential skills to the community.

If selected for the prize, Orbit will invest 100% of the funds (as we usually do) towards improving our school by investing in the infrastructure, sending our High School graduates to university and TVET schools (as we have been doing so far), increasing our farming capacity to better support our beneficiaries and, installing electricity as well as acquisition of learning resources to equip the students for their future. We face financial challenges since the largest population of our funders are individuals donating a small sum of money. Therefore, we struggle to upgrade our facilities or pay our teachers who come from the area a better than average salary. Partnership with Elevate would create a huge impact for people in our community.

In 1995, I came to Kenya as a missionary and photographer and I soon realized the need to put my camera down and fully dedicate myself to helping children. I later founded The Orbit Village Project Inc., 501c3 focused on helping the needy and the most forgotten in Kenya. My vision has been helping families survive a broken generation. With this in mind, for over 25 years, the Orbit Village has continued to  serve communities devastated by HIV-AIDS, extreme poverty, substance abuse, prostutition, lawlessness, and lack of education. 

In the next five years the project looks at doing the following to empower the community it serves: 

• Enrolling more of our high school graduates in college and offering vocational training for students who are unable to advance to college. 

• Expanding the basket weaving program whose purpose is to empower women in the low income locations in Kenya. 

• Employing equipped counselors for PTSD, substance abuse, crisis pregnacy and child abuse at the Mathare center. 

• Expanding our services in Samburu with the construction of a church for charity work and community interaction. Additionally in Samburu, adult education is paramount, Orbit wishes to be a center offering adult education.

According to the World Bank,  Kenya has made significant steps in reducing the number of Kenyans living on less than the international poverty line (US$1.90 per day in 2011 PPP). However, despite the commendable efforts of the Kenyan government to improve the livelihoods of Kenyan citizens, the country remains plagued by staggering inequalities and extreme poverty. The UNDP estimates that, despite a decline in the poverty rate from 46.6% in 2005-2006 to 36.1% in 2015-2016, poverty rates remain above 70% in remote, arid and sparsely populated north-eastern parts of Kenya. These areas include Samburu, an area that Orbit is working to empower pastoralists communities deprived of opportunities to progress.

In Nairobi, many Kenyans living in underserved communities (such as Kayole and Mathare) continue to face challenges as they struggle to put food on their tables and educate their children. The Orbit Village Project (OVP) was created to address poverty in these communities by offering free or subsidized primary and secondary school education, employment and child protection to those in need. On a yearly basis, Orbit is empowering over 1500 people to become self-reliant citizens in their environment.

One of Orbit’s greatest innovations is the children's home which has served hundreds of children. We believe when a sibling group is fractured the family may never recoup. By evaluating individual circumstances, Orbit is able to educate, feed, offer refuge, jobs, health care, guidance, and keep the sibling group intact. Thus, giving the parent/parents free reign to get their lives in control. Often, when Orbit assists the family by taking care of one, two or all children, the family structure will survive and children will eventually pull the family up. When siblings scatter to relatives, join gangs, become sick, addicted, die, live in the street, or become parents, the family may never thrive and will remain vulnerable.

When Covid-19 has shut down all Kenyan schools, we moved quickly to find solutions for how to keep our students engaged in their education.  Since the lack of in person schooling will negatively affect our students,  we offered an alternative to in person learning. We delivered  learning packets to about 400 students throughout  Nairobi through motorcycle deliveries. This initiative kept our students engaged with their education and over 90% of them returned back to school caught up and ready to learn.

The Orbit Village project serves approximately 2,000 individuals who receive services annually. Our programme typically aims to address the constraints that children face due to poor health and malnutrition, by providing material incentives for schooling for children and/or parents or by reducing the cost of schooling. Given that the Kenyan government offers almost no assistance to these individuals, Orbit’s work is integral in the community as it plays a part in empowering families and individuals by helping them become empowered individuals. Children raised and educated through Orbit are now leaders, business owners and professionals and individuals building the next generation of Kenyans building Kenya. 

Further, Orbit is designed to address multiple barriers to education, such as school-feeding, which aim to both improve nutrition and reduce the cost of schooling. We are centered around investing in children consumed by poverty through providing education, security, food and shelter, we transform communities one child at a time. By assisting families in caring for one or two children, Orbit reduces the load of overwhelmed parents coming from poor backgrounds. Additionally, the education and 1300 meals provided daily to hundreds of children, and home-based food support, allows these parents to invest the little money they earn in other necessities.