Madrasa Early Childhood Programme-Kenya (MECP-K) is an early year’s organization that works in partnership with communities, civil society, government, and development partners to implement programmes targeting children aged 0-8 years. The programme was founded in Mombasa, Kenya, in 1986 with the support of the Aga Khan Foundation, and expanded to Tanzania and Uganda in 1991 and 1993 respectively. MECP-K delivers interventions targeting children aged 0-3 focusing on health, nutrition, play and stimulation. Additionally, the programme works with marginalised communities to establish and manage high-quality, gender responsive, culturally relevant, age appropriate, and sustainable pre-schools, targeting children aged 4-6. To date, over 3,000 ECD teachers have benefited from MECP-K’s professional development courses influencing learning outcomes for over 300,000 boys and girls.
About MECP-K's
Until 2013, MECP-K worked directly with community preschools in Coastal Kenya, in subsequent years expanding to include government owned preschools. As the state-run ECD system developed, government and non-governmental organisations increasingly procured MECP-K’s services to strengthen the quality of teaching and build a more effective ECD management system. MECP-K has since entered into partnerships with five county governments in the areas of teacher professional development, capacity development for government officials and ECD management and leadership. Through these partnerships MECP-K has been able to leverage on co-financing and assume a co-delivery approach with the county governments.
The Innovation
The Transition to Scale project is implementing a two-year holistic pre-school model in Nyanza region - Kisumu and Kisii Counties. The model has five interconnected and interdependent pillars: community engagement, teacher professional development, integrated curriculum, school environment and community engagement. The project is co-funded by Grand Challenges Canada and Aga Khan Foundation Canada and focuses on training ECD teachers on high quality and gender responsive pedagogical practices that enhance interaction with, and engagement of young boys and girls.
MECP-K implements this project in partnership with the county governments of Kisii and Kisumu through a formalised partnership anchored on the principles co-financing and co-delivery of interventions. Specifically the project seeks to;
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Deliver professional development course for 600 pre-primary teachers from 200 preschools
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Work collaboratively with government to increase ECD officials knowledge and skills to improve ECD leadership and support
In the long-term, MECP-K aims to have a permanent presence and be the partner of choice to the government and other non-government ECD partners in the delivery of ECD programming and technical services.
Team
Amina Mwitu is a development professional with over 20 years’ experience in Implementing Early Childhood Development programmes through partnerships with communities, civil society organisations, national and subnational government and development partners. Amina is currently the Programme Director of Madrasa Early Childhood Programme-Kenya. In her role Amina is responsible for overall management and leadership of the organisation, leading on and custodian of the organisation’s technical strategy, programme quality, partnerships and stakeholder engagements. Amina holds an MA in Education and International Development from the Institute of Education, University of London, Bachelors of Arts in Sociology, Diploma in Early Childhood Development and a Diploma in Project Planning and Management. Amina is passionate about children and working with families and communities to improve the quality of their lives.
Hezron Rumenya is a Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation professional with over 7 years’ experience in the management of projects in both government and non-governmental organizations. He joined Madrasa Early Childhood Programme-Kenya (MECP-K) in 2015 as a Monitoring and Evaluation Officer. Previously he worked under National State Department of Planning as a field operations assistant during the Transition Implementation Period (TIP – operationalization of devolved governments 2013- 2015 FY). Currently, he is the MECP-K’s Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning (MERL) coordinator supporting all projects under the programme which includes the Transition to Scale project in Kisii and Kisumu.
He holds a Bachelor of Education Science Degree from Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology.
Hezron Rumenya is a Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation professional with over 7 years’ experience in management of projects in both government and non-governmental organizations. He joined Madrasa Early Childhood Programme-Kenya (MECP-K) in 2015 as a Monitoring and Evaluation Officer. Previously he worked under National State Department of Planning as a field operations assistant during the Transition Implementation Period (TIP – operationalization of devolved governments 2013- 2015 FY). Currently he is the MECP-K’s Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning (MERL) coordinator supporting all projects under the programme which includes the Transition to Scale project in Kisii and Kisumu.
He holds a Bachelor of Education Science Degree from Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology.
