RESEARCH BACKGROUND
The Evolving Street Children Challenge
Urban residents in Kenya have witnessed an alarming proliferation of street children seeking their livelihood in the streets in legal and illegal activities. The appearance of street children who seem to spend most of their time in the streets of Nairobi city can be traced to the late 1960’s, and since then the children have become increasingly visible. Several factors have contributed to the existence and proliferation of street children in Nairobi. Major contributing factors include; global economic recession, rapid urbanization, high unemployment rate, rising cost of living, social disintegration, family breakdowns and AIDS pandemic. Both the children “of” and “on” the streets suffer from varying degrees of neglect, abuse and exploitation by the same adults who are supposed to be responsible for their welfare and development. Some children have been born and have been born and raised in the streets, without the care and affection they need, and are extremely vulnerable to every form of exploitation.
Problems of alcoholism and drug abuse by the parents of the children appear to be a very common issue. It has been observed that most young street parents are most of the time under the effects of drugs rendering them psychologically and physically unstable. This drug usage is however prompted by the very many problems thy have to face and are unable to cope with.
Another Background
This directory for street children caregivers has been created to build on information sharing and to add value to existing efforts. It is hoped it will make the institutions reflect on their interventions, share ideas, know each other and identify areas of collaboration for effective action. This directory was commissioned by Koinonia Community, a lay Christian organization operating several projects of human development in Kenya, Zambia and Sudan. KARDS, a Community Development Consultancy, undertook the role of coordinating the research project and Coalition of Organizations for Capacity Enhancement of Street Children Interventions (COCESCI), a children institutional capacity building program, contributed to the technical issues concerning management of children institutions.
The Methodology
Introduction
The survey to compile this directory was conducted between May and July 2006. The exercise began with literature review followed by a meeting of caregivers in Nairobi who discussed and shared on their experiences. Most of the materials for literature review were provided by COCESCI. From the literature review and experiences on the ground, common terminologies in the process of protection and care of street children were developed and they included street work, rehabilitation, reintegration, outreach and networking. These experiences were then summarized into a questionnaire. Researchers were then identified and were inducted thoroughly for a period of five days into the work of providing care and protection to street children for a period of three days. They went to Embakasi constituency to test the research tool. From the finding of tool testing exercise, the questionnaire was adjusted to reflect what was found on the field. The researchers were eventually dispatched to different constituencies of Nairobi. Each constituency was covered in a period of two days by two to three research assistants. Other places that were covered included Ngong town in Kajiado North, Kabete Constituency and Juja Constituency. After a visit to each constituency, the research assistants would come together to share of their field experiences in preparation for the next visit. All agreed that a very positive fact about this research was the level of enthusiasm from most respondents.
Sample design and Procedures
A sample of eleven constituencies was chosen for this survey exercise. The main areas of interest were the Nairobi constituencies then followed by those constituencies that closely bordered Nairobi such as Juja, Kabete and Ngong. From each constituency the most familiar children institutions were identified and from these institutions, the researchers were snowballed to other institutions within the constituency. In other instances the researchers had to look for street children who would lead them to the institutions. In each constituency, the researchers identified government institutions, capacity building and advocacy institutions, children centres and homes, initiatives for economic livelihood or self help groups dealing directly with the plight of the street children and formal, non formal and informal educational institutions working with the children.
Data Processing and Analysis
Qualitative data was organized and analyzed in themes. The main aim being to give more authenticity to the quantitative data. Quantitative data was processed and analyzed using excel software. Descriptive data, frequency tables, percentage tables, pie charts and bar graphs were then developed to present the data. The findings of this survey were then discussed during the dissemination workshop where more information was adopted and survey findings validated.
Limitations of the Survey
Due to funding problems the survey could not be extended to a wider outreach and were only limited to Nairobi and its environs including Juja, Ngong and Kabete. There was no enough means to carry out enough marketing for the exercise and thus there were a few institutions that did not provide their own data and hence information on their activities may be lacking from this directory. Some of the problems experienced by the research assistants during the data collection exercise included: -
- Difficulties in identifying the physical location of the institutions. Some of the locations lacked of efficient public transport means. Some of the areas were simply not accessible.
- Lack of the right respondents: The managers in some of the institutions were not in office and the officers found were reluctant to provide some information or simply could not satisfactorily answer some of the questions. Some directors promised to fill in the questionnaires but could not be able to submit them in time to be included in this directory. Some respondents too preferred prior appointments and could not be in a position to submit their information by the time the data compilation was over. Others gave appointments that they did not honour.
Some location and neighbourhood proved not to be safe to some of our researchers. One of our lady researchers nearly lost her hand bag to a band of street children.
Another challenge during the research was the language barrier in some of the places as the respondents could not be able to express themselves appropriately.
Other respondents had high expectations and looked at the whole research experience as a moment to mobilize resources.
Research Backgro... 
