Friends and supporters gathered in the north Dallas home of AB and Scott Aston for a reception and update on the Imbirikani Girls High School (IGS) in Kenya. Last summer, AB Aston and daughter Mary Kate went to Kenya on a mission trip sponsored by Highland Park Presbyterian Church and visited the school, meeting the girls whose lives are being forever changed with the education they are receiving.

Mary Kate, a 2014 graduate from the University of Georgia, was so profoundly affected by what she experienced on the trip that she turned down corporate job offers to accept a development position at the Neema-Huruma Foundation which raises funds for the school. In Swahili, Neema-Huruma means grace and mercy.

“I have the opportunity to make a difference, “ said Mary Kate. “The gratitude the girls show is beyond belief.”

The school opened in 2006 by founders Clyde and Betsy Jackson to provide education to Maasai children living in the Imbirikani Group Ranch area of southwest Kenya. 98% of girls in the area do not have educational opportunities after primary school so they enter into early marriages at ages 14-15 and are subjected to a life of child bearing and hard physical labor carrying wood and water. Continuing education for these girls provides a promising future. The school which is owned and operated by the Presbyterian Church of East Africa (PCEA) opened with 40 students and now has capacity for 300. 

“Our goal is to elevate the girls’ lives,” said Jackson. “The Imbirikani Girls High School provides the education that is desperately needed by the young women of the Maasai tribe and other tribes. Parents from as far away as Kisumu, Nairobi, and Mombasa are sending their daughters now to IGS for its reputation for excellent academics and Godly character building.”

The Highland Park Presbyterian Church has been continually involved in the project and formed relationships with the PCEA. A mission team with 10-12 HPPC church members has come to the campus in Kenya for the past eight years to conduct Christian Growth Seminars that touch the lives of over 2,500 people in the area each year, and many other discipleship and evangelist initiatives have been launched as a result. These mission teams also assist the PCEA and has constructed seven churches in the area.

Further information about the Imbirikani Girls High School and the Neema-Huruma Foundation is available at www.nhkenya.org.

Photos by Deborah Brown