We'll use this blog to both communicate our safe comings and goings and to document our experiences. We'll try to post every day, but there may be some locations where internet is spotty - don't panic if a day passes without a post!
Quick background. I'm Brandon Clarke, Director of Global Education at the Berkeley Carroll School. This is my fourth time leading BC's Kenya program, and this is our largest group to date, with 18 students and 2 other faculty. You'll be hearing from me very little: there will be 20 voices eager to recount and reflect as we spend two weeks experiencing different aspects of Kenya.
Our primary destination is Oloika, a trading post located in Shompole, a Maasai group ranch just north of the Tanzanian border.
We will spend a week in Shompole, learning about the community and how it is navigating the challenges brought by climate change. Shompole lies at the bottom of the Great Rift Valley, a deep trench that stretches from Jordan to Mozambique. The arid climate has been exacerbated by climate change, and the Maasai, who are pastoralists by tradition, have lost most the cattle herds on which they depend. But this remarkable community has developed a number of goals and projects that will help it survive into the future, including significant investment in the local primary school. Education, the elders reason, will ensure the community's continued strength. We will work with local volunteers on a construction project, get to know the school's students, visit with community leaders, and have homestays in traditional Maasai bomas. At the end of the program, we will go on safari in the Maasai Mara, where we'll learn about Kenya's extraordinary wildlife and how it, too, is being affected by climate change. Stay tuned - you're going to read some terrific posts in the coming weeks!
