Buzzwords such as extracurricular learning and action pedagogy are often heard when it comes to opening up opportunities for students not only to learn cognitively for school or to live in the virtual world, but also to learn about the world and about their own possibilities for shaping it, i.e. about their self-efficacy, in contact with reality. There is a great demand among students today for suitable fields of action, they want to make a difference – just think of Fridays for Future!

In a globalized world, economic issues are crucial for the future of humanity. People are urgently needed who, motivated by social impulses, can move competently in this field and also act energetically.

A growing number of school projects with student-run companies show that more and more schools are recognizing a work assignment for themselves here. But how do you give students room for maneuver that is not limited to classroom projects, but has a lasting impact in the world? This is where Nyendo’s impulse comes in. We offer the following components:

1. 1. In exchange with partner schools in Germany and Austria, students report on each other’s experiences and thus learn from each other. In addition, there are
   • monthly online video conferences for the managing directors of the student companies, in which the teachers, who accompany them as coaches, are also allowed to participate.
   • annual retreats for all employees of the student companies and the coaches.
   2. A partner school in Nairobi, with which your students communicate through Nyendo.
   • Nyendo regularly surveys current needs on site in Nairobi and supports the slum schools in formulating project applications.
   • These project applications are checked for feasibility by competent teams in Kenya and Germany and, if necessary, forwarded to your student company with an appropriate recommendation. The students then decide for themselves whether they want to support this project with their donations from the proceeds of their work.
   • Nyendo takes over the entire project management and also the documentation. Your students will be kept up to date on the progress of the project and thus directly experience what positive results they have achieved with their work.
   • Every year, your students will receive a detailed report on the use of the donated funds.
   • Your students communicate with their partner school via e-mail and Skype.
   • Once a year, Nyendo invites one or two Kenyan principals to Europe to visit the network schools there and tell the students about their school and thus about life in a completely different world.
   • At the end of at least two years of cooperation in the student company, your students have the opportunity to go on a project trip to Kenya through Nyendo, visit their partner school and live on site in the slum. Their travel reports, in turn, are an effective way to strengthen the student company.
   • In this way, your students will build a personal relationship over time, which will be an important motivation for sustainable planning of the student company beyond their own year: Your students will actively seek to sustain the student company and motivate subsequent grades to participate. The younger students will then be trained by the older ones.
   • The alumni have the possibility to stay in contact with the student company and the partner school via a corresponding network offer of Nyendo and to support both actively.
   • In addition, Nyendo also supports the networking of the currently 14 slum schools with each other and with other organizations and offers training on accounting, project management and conference management, but also on permaculture gardens and regional currencies, etc., with the declared aim of making the slum schools as independent as possible from the support of Nyendo and the European partner school.
   • On the part of Nyendo.lernen hand in hand UG you as a school or your student company will also receive:
   • Exchange, consulting and training of the teachers who accompany your student company as coaches.
   • Consulting for the student company
   • Marketing materials
   • Access to our online manual (still under construction)
   • Insight into the work of the entire network through the monthly newsletter and the quarterly newsletter via e-mail
   • Every two years a personal visit to your school by the managing director, Mrs. Wutte or the institute director, Dr. Piecha.
   • Information on calls for proposals and competitions, advice on fundraising
   3. On the side of Nyendo.lernen, you as a school or your student company also receive:
   • Exchange, consulting and training of the teachers who accompany your student company as coaches.
   • Consulting for the student company
   • Marketing materials
   • Access to our online manual (still under construction)
   • Insight into the work of the entire network through the monthly newsletter and the quarterly newsletter via e-mail
   • Every two years a personal visit to your school by the managing director, Mrs. Wutte or the institute director, Dr. Piecha.
   • Information on calls for proposals and competitions, advice on fundraising
   • A template for a portfolio in which the students document and reflect on their work and learning path on their own responsibility, supplemented by a work certificate from the student company, confirmations of participation from the coach and Nyendo.lernen hand in hand UG and, in the case of a project trip, an expert opinion from the Kenyan principal.
   • If required, legal advice on questions concerning the student company via the ProBono lawyers of Nyendo.lernen.
   • If required, advice on accounting issues by specialists of Nyendo.lernen hand in hand UG.

80% of the inhabitants of Nairobi live on only 5% of the living space in slums, that is several million people who live cramped in small corrugated iron huts, without water connection or sanitary facilities between garbage and open sewers. Some of them have taken it upon themselves to provide the children in their neighborhood with a school education and have founded schools on their own initiative. Almost 160 teachers are currently teaching almost 4200 children at the 14 Kenyan Nyendo schools. These teachers earn on average about 1 € per day. During the four months of vacations, which are required by law in Kenya, there is no salary at all. Of the more than 4000 school children, only a good 1200 can pay the school fees of about 7.50 € per month. If you go to any supermarket, however, the food prices are not much lower than in our country. Some of the schools have too few desks, no or completely inadequate sanitary facilities, and rooms that are far too small and in which several classes have to be taught in parallel, almost in the dark. A lot can already be achieved there with small sums of money. On the other hand, our students are very impressed by the social commitment and personal dedication of the teachers there and especially the principals. Even though there are hundreds of other self-help schools in the slums of Nairobi alone, as the size of the Nyendo network continues to grow, it would be easily conceivable to become active elsewhere in the world.