There is something about little kids in Kenya that I look forward to with every visit.

They have absolutely zero chill. And I mean that in the best possible way.

When we pull up to a school, the little ones don't wait to see what's happening. They just run. Full sprint, toward the vehicles, racing the vehicles to the school. They are waiting for the doors to open, and as soon as we give a smile and wave upon arrival, a joyful noise erupts. Walking into a classroom, the little ones are anxiously waiting to give high-fives, practice greetings in English, and will mimic every silly face I can come up with. I often take the opportunity to sit at an empty desk, soon to be bombarded by kids wanting to touch my arm hair and try on my sunglasses. There is no awkward small talk with a first grader in Kenya. There is only: “Here I am, here you are, and we are now friends.”

It's the best.

When we first began our processes for surveying and collecting data, we had two: one for teachers, one for students. Simple enough. Teachers give incredible insights. But we quickly realized the students who were easiest to survey were the older ones. The teenagers who understood better what we were asking, and could give us real answers. The younger kids? Much harder to capture in a standard interview format. The younger learners were the ones with the most energy, most excited to run and play, and jump to the front of the crowd out of curiosity. But to separate a younger learner from the crowd and ask them survey questions was a whole different story. Without the security of their fellow classmates, they became a bit more reserved and unable to engage well with the interviewer.

And it’s the younger kids who are most likely to show up to school barefoot.

It was actually the older students who kept telling us about the younger ones. We heard it over and over, unprompted, with the older kids describing how they carry their younger siblings to school. We heard it through our surveys, when we asked about their biggest concerns around not having shoes—they weren’t only talking about themselves; they talked about their brothers and sisters whose feet were growing faster and they didn’t have shoes to grow into. Their worry was specific and pointed at the kids we weren’t yet hearing from directly.

We were collecting data. But we were missing some very important voices, which was evident as we were sharing the results of our surveys.

So we went back and developed a third set of questions, designed specifically for classrooms up to grade 5. Questions where the kids raised their hands, surrounded by the comfort of their classmates. Questions that asked for volunteers to answer, and kids felt confident to do so within the structure of their familiar classrooms. 

It worked! The younger learners expressed an eagerness to learn, naming subjects ranging from Science to English to Mathematics as their favorites. Those who were a bit shy got help from other students, jumping in to help answer questions. When one learner said they wanted to be a teacher, others nodded in agreement. Others expressed a desire to be a pilot. In one classroom, a student hoped to be a soccer player, which was also echoed by others nearby. And sure enough, we heard stories of these young children how they had outgrown their one pair of shoes, or how they had one pair of Crocs that were falling apart. Entire classrooms where dozens of kids shared with us that they had experienced a foot injury from walking barefoot. 

While the individual student survey questions weren’t effective in getting a younger student to share, the classroom surveys provided a space where they more eagerly answered the questions. And finally, we had additional data we felt confident to share. 

We’re still in the early days with data collection. The data is coming in, the patterns are forming, and we’re learning as we go. But with the right levels of curiosity and a willingness to go back and ask again, THAT’S where good impact measurement starts.

April Impact Dashboard