AEGiS-USIS: Scholarship Program Helps AIDS Orphans Fulfill a Dream

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2006. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Scholarship Program Helps AIDS Orphans Fulfill a Dream

USIS Washington File - November 22, 2006

Morris Kaburu, age 20, like many others in Kenya, has lost one or both parents to HIV/AIDS. At age 8, Kaburu lost his mother. Then, with a father who took very little care of his needs and uncles who sent him away from the only home he knew, hope seemed like a myth. Kaburu, struggling through life with a stepmother and an abusive father, relied on a government scholarship to attend school. His father later died of HIV-related complications, a fact that his uncles hid from him because of fear of stigma.

For many young people like Kaburu, education has been a casualty of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. To address this problem, the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (Emergency Plan/PEPFAR) supports programs to help children attend school. Started in 2004 with support from PEPFAR, the Peace Corps Orphans Scholarship Program has been bringing hope to orphans who have lost parents or guardians to AIDS-related illnesses.

In partnership with host nations, PEPFAR supports a wide-range of efforts to help families, communities and governments care for children living with and affected by HIV/AIDS.

PEPFAR programs include caregiver training, support for access to education, economic support, targeted food and nutritional support, legal aid, medical, psychological and emotional care, and other social and material support.

The Joint U.N. Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) estimates that more than 15 million children have lost one or both parents to HIV/AIDS. Because this number will almost double over the next 10 years, support for orphans and vulnerable children is critical.

Despite all his hardships, Kaburu still found time to volunteer at a Kenya Red Cross outstation in the town of Meru, approximately 352 kilometers outside Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. "One of the most ironic things about working at the station was that I counseled youth and trained them in peer leadership, yet I needed such guidance myself," Kaburu said.

Kaburu's leadership in high school was obvious and his excellent performance in academics remarkable. However, Kaburu notes, "It is one thing to be intelligent, and a totally different one to have money to finance educational advancement of that intelligence. ... This was unachievable."

Today, Kaburu is a first-year law student at Moi University in Eldoret, Kenya. He is one of the most enthusiastic young beneficiaries of the Peace Corps Orphans Scholarship Program. Kaburu first learned about the scholarship program from a former Peace Corps Volunteer, who served in Kaburu' home region.

"There is something about volunteering and helping other people that connects you with people who care about you," Kaburu said.

The scholarship program gave Kaburu hope that he could achieve his dream of becoming a lawyer. "I want to be a human rights lawyer. I have seen it all, and law is my way of ending what I have gone through," he stated.

With the support of the American people, young leaders like Kaburu are leading the fight against HIV/AIDS in their nations and communities, restoring hope for a brighter future.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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