Kenya: Global Teacher Prize winner Peter Tabichi says ‘invest in youth’

Peter Tabichi, who won the USD 1 million Global Teacher Prize returned home on Wednesday, March 27 to pomp and pageantry. The Franciscan friar had a message for Africa: Invest in youth.

Kenyan Science teacher Peter Tabichi called his win a testimony that the continent has great people. “It’s a victory for Kenya, for Africa and the whole world. It shows that our young people, given the chance, if we invest in the young people, they are going to do great things,” he said. He also said there is a need to encourage more girls to pursue science and to expose all students to technology. Peter Tabichi routinely gives away most of his salary to the school. He intends to do the same with his cash prize. “I intend to give it back to society,” he said.

Africa has the youngest population in the world, according to the United Nations Development Program. Yet many youths express frustration with what they call a lack of opportunities to improve their lives. The award’s citation says Tabichi has turned around lives in at Keriko Mixed Day Secondary School in Nakuru county, which has only one computer, poor internet and a student-teacher ratio of 58:1.

His involvement in the science club has seen 60 percent of the student’s projects qualify for national competitions. Last year the school placed first among public schools in the Kenya Science and Engineering Fair 2018. Students showed off a device they had invented to allow blind and deaf people to measure objects.

Tabichi and four colleagues tutor students in Maths and Science outside class and on the weekends, when he visits students’ homes and meets their families to understand the challenges they face.

With inputs from agencies.

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