SEEK (Skills Education for Employment in Kakuma)

Awardees: Jessica Huang (HSPH), Reuben Muzungu (External), and Roger Tessier (External)

Summary: SEEK works to improve access to learning and employment opportunities among adult refugees in Kenya, in collaboration with the refugee-led community-based organization (CBO), Samaritan Association. By using an innovative asset-based model, SEEK is able to leverage existing resources (such as primary school facilities that remain unused in the evenings and weekends) to resourcefully provide accessible adult educational programming in a refugee camp. SEEK focuses on adults based on community input about current gaps in the learning ecosystem for adults, since many humanitarian organizations working in education in Kakuma focus on youth. The livelihoods of adult refugees have important implications for the rest of the family because by investing in skills development for the main breadwinners, their income can potentially be increased and consequently also their ability to provide more education, health care and stability to youth – helping to break the cycle of poverty by setting the next generation up for better livelihood opportunities as well.