Despite Kenya’s commitment to free and compulsory education, Samburu County continues to experience high levels of educational exclusion, with up to 40% of children aged 6–17 out of school. Poverty, pastoralist lifestyles, long distances to schools, and harmful cultural practices such as child marriage, teenage pregnancy, and female genital mutilation disproportionately affect girls and prevent many children from enrolling or staying in school.
Formal education systems in Kenya are often not designed for older children who have never attended school or who have large learning gaps. Many out-of-school children aged 10–14 are considered “too old” to join lower primary classes, leaving them without a realistic pathway back into education.
Samburu Girls Foundation began the Nabulaa Accelerator Learning Program (NALP) in 2018 to provide an age-appropriate, flexible pathway into education for these learners. The program addresses not only academic gaps but also the social, emotional, and economic barriers that keep children out of school. NALP was designed to equip children with foundational literacy and numeracy skills and to help children catch up quickly, regain confidence, and transition successfully into formal education.
NALP is a one-year accelerated learning program aligned with Kenya’s Competency-Based Curriculum, delivered in public primary schools by trained ECDE teachers. It targets out-of-school children aged 10–14, prioritizing girls and inclusion of children with disabilities. Learners are identified through community structures, assessed, and enrolled to cover foundational literacy and numeracy equivalent to lower primary before transitioning to Grade 3. The program integrates psychosocial support, life skills, and digital literacy, while providing meals, uniforms, and learning materials. It also engages families to address social barriers to education. With continuous tracking and support, over 80% of learners successfully transition and remain in formal education.
Since 2018, NALP has reached more than 2,500 out-of-school children and currently supports over 700 learners annually across 22 learning clusters in Samburu County. More than 80% of learners successfully transition into formal education, and over 2,000 girls have participated in the program.
Over the last two years, the program has expanded into additional wards, strengthened partnerships with schools and local education authorities, and introduced stronger digital literacy and life-skills components. Community engagement has also deepened, contributing to changing attitudes toward girls’ education and reducing harmful practices.
NALP has demonstrated that accelerated education can work effectively in pastoralist and marginalized communities. The model is designed for replication and can be adapted to similar underserved contexts globally.
In the next 2–3 years, Samburu Girls Foundation aims to scale NALP to more regions in Samburu, strengthen digital and remedial learning approaches, and contribute to the development of national guidelines for accelerated education programs.
Since its establishment, NALP has evolved from a small pilot serving a few communities into a structured accelerated education model operating across multiple wards. Over the last two years, the program has added digital literacy, stronger psychosocial support, and enhanced learner tracking systems.
The model has also expanded beyond classroom learning to include household economic strengthening, community dialogue, and more targeted support for girls at risk of child marriage or school dropout. SGF has improved teacher training and introduced more regular monitoring to strengthen learning outcomes and long-term retention.
Organizations can adopt NALP by partnering with Samburu Girls Foundation for training, implementation tools, and technical support. Key steps include community engagement, learner identification, teacher training, and collaboration with local schools and education authorities. Contact: info@samburugirls.foundation
