St. Martin Kaewa’s Journey to becoming GIC Champions

These simple innovations led to a period of fast growth, which meant the young seedlings required staking so as to grow upright. The school also fenced the woodlot to protect the seedling from straying animals during the school holidays, and nurturing tips on how to prune were provided periodically by KenGen and partners environmental experts.

“We were always tense during the monitoring and evaluation visits by KenGen staff. It was always difficult to read the faces of the officers who came for periodic evaluation exercises. Though they kept encouraging us to do the good work we were doing, they always left us guessing as to the level of competition. Different teams came in to evaluate the project”, says Mrs. Kitavi.

Innovations and seedling survival rates were some of the criteria used in determining the winners of the challenge. 25% of the schools involved in the exercise opted to protect their tree seedlings from animals and human interference through fencing their plots which guaranteeda 70% survival rate. Some schools applied drip irrigation with used bottles while others used mulching, a cultural method for water conservation that increases soil organic matter and survival rate.

“In two years of nurturing the seedling to 3-metre heights, our greatest joy was in the announcement that we were the eventual winners.

“Not only had we won but we had actually beaten 80 other schools. The magnitude of the achievement dawned on the whole school when we were notified that 30 students would enjoy a trip to Mombasa to visit KenGen’s Kipevu power plant and Bamburi Cement’s Haller Park among other areas at coast. We must say that we are extremely proud of this lifetime achievement”, says an elated Mrs. Kitavi.

St. Martin Kaewa Secondary school emerged the overall winner of the GIC phase I competition which has since then expanded to phase II to include 900 school within the three counties of Machakos, Embu and Makueni in the next 10 years. The school was also awarded a 20,000 litre water tank and a cash prize of Ksh. 40,000.