Well, this is pretty cool. Our very own Kennedy Odede ’12, “executive director of Shining Hope for Communities, a social services organization,” wrote an op-ed for the New York Times about “slum tourism” in the Kibera slums in Nairobi, Kenya. He attacks “slum tourism,” suggesting, essentially that it treats the poorest people like zoo animals–subjects […]
On Thursday, April 11, the First Year Matters (FYM) committee announced that the common reading for the Class of 2023 will be “Find Me Unafraid: Love, Loss, and Hope in an African Slum” by Kennedy Odede ’12 and Jessica Posner ’09. Each year, the FYM program selects a common reading for incoming students, which provides […]
Last weekend, Shining Hope for Communities (SHOFCO) Executive Director Kennedy Odede ’12 served as a panelist with former President Bill Clinton and Sean Penn at the fourth annual Clinton Global Initiative University (CGI U) Meeting at the University of California San Diego (UCSD).
When activists consider about how to improve the conditions of life in Africa, they tend to approach the continent’s vast problems in a number of ways. On Wednesday, around 70 students and staff in Usdan heard two experts, Samuel Watulatsu and Kennedy Odede ’12, espouse a relatively similar attitude toward addressing East African poverty—one that stressed self-reliance over outside relief. Although the presenters were generally of the same mind, Odede’s dynamic and deeply personal address provided a stark contrast to Watulatsu’s straightforward PowerPoint-based speech—a difference that highlighted the generation gap between the two.
Relatively stable only days before, Kibera, the home of Kennedy Odede ’12, suddenly became ground zero in the violent conflict between Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) leader Raila Odinga in late December, 2007. Having barely escaped across the country to the coastal city of Mombosa, Odede and his friends sat in shock, watching their homes burn on the television screen.
For the three years after he graduated high school, Kennedy Odede ’12 of Kibera, Kenya carried rocks between a train and a factory for a dollar a day. The work was tiresome and unrewarding, yet Odede’s parents — like some 80 percent of the citizens of Kibera — could not find jobs, and so Odede was also responsible for feeding his seven younger siblings.
Over the past several days, a New York Times op-ed Kennedy Odede ’12 wrote last summer about slum tourism has been repeatedly cycling through my mind (and my conversations with friends, because apparently I am a walking, talking advertisement for Wesleyan).
While many students were startled by the violent altercation on Fountain Avenue last semester, public violence is nothing new for Kennedy Odede ’12. Hailing from the Kenyan slum of Kibera, Odede comes from a place where there are no police, a place where violence is the law.
The Argus was told to direct all communication with The Board through the president’s office while trustees met with students and faculty over the weekend. The University’s board of trustees convened over the weekend amongst each other and student representatives in break-out sessions available only to a select group of invited student and faculty representatives. […]
In 2004, Kennedy Odede ’12 spent twenty cents on a soccer ball and started a youth group. Inspired by a book of Martin Luther King’s speeches, he wanted to foster a sense of hope in his hometown of Kibera, Kenya, one of the largest African slums. He called his group Shining Hope for Communities (SHOFCO). […]