Ol Pejeta Conservancy hosts a golf tournament aiming to raise Sh20 million to support over 300 bright and needy students through scholarships in Laikipia County.
The charity event held at the Nanyuki sports club on Saturday and Sunday attracted both seasoned and emerging golfers and aimed to support the education initiative for vulnerable learners in the region.
“The golf tournament will focus on ensuring funding for more scholarships because we believe education has a lasting impact for our schools,” said Kelvin Gitau, Olpajeta Community Manager in charge of Education.
He emphasized that the funds will address critical gaps in education by improving learning institutions around the conservancy, many of which are currently in poor condition.
“We work with schools around the Ol Pejeta conservancy zone; most of the schools are wooden, and the students hence lack a conducive learning environment due to poor weather conditions. We hope to construct classrooms and provide better learning,” Gitau noted.
He highlighted that they support about 60 schools with scholarships, infrastructure development, conservation education programmes, and some other 55 schools benefit from digital literacy education aimed to better the learners through technology.
The majority of this year’s scholarship beneficiaries are expected to be Grade 10 students. Previously, the conservancy’s education initiative has supported 411 students.
“This is our 2nd edition after last year’s, which was celebrating Olpajeta at 20 years and this we devised by focusing on promoting our education through golf tournaments,” revealed Gitau.
The tournament formed a broader commitment to transforming education and conservation awareness in the region, ensuring that learners living adjacent to the conservancy have better opportunities through education.
“We understand that people who live around the conservancy have experiences economic hardship and we have seen students who have not joined grade 8, its quite disturbing, we are trying to ensure all our students in our community qualified to go to good schools they don’t miss out the opportunity due to lack of funds,” Gitau said.
By Muturi Mwangi
