Yaro

Meet Yaro (pseudonym), a 16-year-old boy who decided to turn his life around. Yaro was a good student who had excellent attendance and studied hard to keep his grades up.

Due to school closure during COVID-19, Yaro was not able to go to school or attend the online class regularly. His grades dropped significantly. Yaro started to hang out with the wrong crowd and no longer cared about attending school.

When his school reopened, Yaro was extremely behind and couldn’t keep up with the other students. He lost his confidence and motivation to continue school. After a couple of months, Yanoi stopped attending school altogether and wanted to drop out of school permanently.

Our education advocacy team began working closely with Yaro to support him in building his confidence back by providing counseling and regular monthly check-ins. Yaro started to come to the Learning Center regularly to meet with other students, hang out in the garden, and especially play football.

When we saw Yaro start to build up his confidence, our education advocacy team tried a new approach by encouraging Yaro’s friends to convince him to go back to school.

Six months later, Yaro himself came to the education advocacy team to ask for help in getting him back to public school. His friends were able to help convince Yaro of the benefits of returning to school. We were thrilled when he came in to ask for our help re-enrolling him in school. CFI helped Yaro with the re-enrollment process for public school and provided school materials to ensure he’s ready to start attending school again.

When we asked Yaro what made him decide to re-enroll in school again, he said, “I saw my friends going to school, and they can learn new things every day. I want to have knowledge like them.”

“I know if I study hard, my future will be brighter. I’m going to have a better job and earn more money,” Yaro adds.

Yaro now attends school regularly and maintains good grades. He also participates in some of our other projects at CFI like the Next Generation Initiative (NGI), the Duke of Edinburgh Award, and Just For Kicks. Yanoi is active both in school and at home; he always offers to help others if needed.

Yanoi is happy with his decision and he is thriving! We’re so proud of him. We can’t wait to see the great thing he’s going to accomplish in this life.

Thank you to everyone who was involved in making this child’s future better. Our partnership with you, our supporters, is greatly appreciated to continue to help make a difference in our community. Our goal to help our community’s at-risk youth and support their well-being couldn’t be achieved without your help!