Our Story
At the age of 14, Aruna Kenyi boarded a flight from Sudan to America, without his mother and father. He was separated from them when a violent militia attacked the village where he was born. After the attack, like so many other Sudanese "Lost Boys", Kenyi walked for over a year through his country, drifting from village to village and refugee camp to refugee camp, looking for home. After living in refugee camps as a young boy for over five years, he was abruptly given word that he would, at long last, be able to move to America. He flew to the U.S. without his parents, not knowing whether they were still alive. Almost a decade after he left his village and began the long, painful journey to Maine, Kenyi was enrolled as a student at Portland High School, trying to build his future. It was only then that he received a photograph in the mail of his mother and father and learned that they were still alive.
Since then, he has graduated from Portland High School, published Between Two Rivers, a memoir, with The Telling Room, Portland's nonprofit youth writing center. He is now attending the University of Maine at Farmington, where he majors in Community Health Education. His dream is to teach high school and eventually return as an educator to his home village of Kansuk. As part of his current studies, Kenyi has been tasked with creating a meaningful public health project for the community. He is using this as an opportunity to travel back to his native Sudan for the first time in over a decade to create a school lunch program for the rural Kansuk Primary School in Kajo Keji County, an impoverished, isolated area with extremely limited resources.
The Impact
When children in Kansuk go to school, they attend from early morning til
late afternoon, and they have no access to food while classes are in
session.The schools themselves are all volunteer-run, and there are virtually no local or government resources to invest in a food program for children like the ones that our students in the U.S. benefit from. Studies show that there is a strong link between adequate nutrition and the academic and personal success of young children. Chronically undernourished children have difficulty concentrating, score lower on achievement tests, and have more difficulty resisting infection. They are more likely to get sick, miss school, fall behind in class, have lower energy, and have negatively affected cognitive functioning.
This summer, when Kenyi travels to Kansuk, he will meet with business, community, and government leaders to build support for his program. He will recruit community members and volunteers to cook for students so that they can receive simple meals: primarily rice and beans. Once the program is off the ground, he'll recruit a staff person to carry on the project's momentum, and: the entire process of Kenyi's journey to pioneer this school lunch program will be documented on film, which can be used a tool to educate others about the needs of children in Kansuk and the importance of nutrition for students.
What We Need
Funding from this campaign will support: the initial cost of food for students during this summer's program launch; Kenyi's travel expenses; cooking equipment; and the cost of bringing on a staff person to continue the project once Kenyi returns to Maine this fall to finish his studies.
Other Ways You Can Help
Spread the word by tweeting this campaign and posting it on your Facebook wall. Set a link to us as your gmail chat status message. Email your friends and family about why you are supporting our cause, and ask them to do the same.
