Hope for Kenya Slum Adolescents Initiative

Hope for Kenya Slum Adolescents Initiative (HKSAI) works to advance opportunities for low-income Kenyan adolescent girls living in slums through investments in their education, health, skills training, life skills, and job prospects.

HKSAI provides counseling and mentoring services to empower young people with the information they need to lead healthy and dignified lives. The organization also helps teens attain quality education through scholarships and provides financial resources and skills development to help young people start their own small businesses.

HKSAI’s training program provides teachings on social entrepreneurship and savings, impacts of drug and substance abuse, adolescent sexuality and reproductive health, HIV/AIDS, and prevention of gender-based violence. HKSAI also creates a space for young people to demand social justice through community dialogues, which help engage policy makers on issues affecting young people, including sexual and reproductive health and rights, early and forced marriage, and gender-based violence

HKSAI was founded in 2018 by Melvine Ouyo. Growing up in a small village in Busia County on Kenya’s western border, Melvine witnessed firsthand the pain and suffering of women and girls due to gender-based violence and teen pregnancy. Her own mother was only 16 when she gave birth to her.