Bethsaida Children Centre in Soweto, Kenya, started in 2012 as a small community-based organization registered with the government. The centre started off with a few children but as word spread, more and more children started coming to the centre as the increasing number of orphans, destitute and street children would stay around the streets of Soweto. The centre eventually became too small to accommodate all the children, and so the founders decided to register as a foundation to open up a school and a technical course centre.

Current situation

The purpose of the Centre is to provide feeding, clothing, health care, sponsorship, and counselling services to destitute, orphaned, and at-risk children, which are part of community development initiatives to assist drug addicts, dropouts, HIV-infected and affected individuals and street children.

They also try to keep the family together whenever possible and provide support to the family. The social worker also provides counselling to the child and his/her family to help them understand the trauma they have experienced and how to move forward. After the initial assessment, the child is assigned a case manager who works with him/her and his/her family to meet their needs.

Opportunity to help

Some of the challenges that the centre is facing are; several children are forced to sleep on the cold floor at night due to the lack of adequate and suitable beds and bedding, insufficient supply of stationery, School fees are not sufficient to support children's education at all levels, including primary, secondary, and tertiary and lack of enough space to sustain the children’s population. We are hoping to raise 630 $ to ensure we put a smile on children in Bethsaida Centre.