Michael

In 2014, Michael and his family were forced to flee their home in the Democratic Republic of Congo due to violent conflict. Michael was just 10 years old at the time and some of his siblings were even younger.

When Michael, his parents, and seven siblings arrived in Nairobi in 2014, they faced extreme challenges. Although the family had little to eat and were forced to live on the street, it was still safer than their home country. “You cannot live in a place where there is no peace. If you stay, it’s like you’re waiting for death,” Michael told us when explaining the situation in his home country.

Many refugees in Michael’s position don’t have the opportunity to access education. Survival is the priority and many teenage refugees have no choice but to work in order to support their families. Eager to learn and continue his education, Michael read in his free time and his family enrolled him in primary school. In Kenya, primary school expenses are covered by the government, but individuals must pay fees for secondary school, the equivalent of high school in the U.S. After Michael finished his primary education, RefugePoint began covering his secondary school fees and the cost of uniforms, school supplies, and books so that he could continue his education.

Michael has a natural love for learning and he’s an excellent student. His ambitions to pursue higher education reach back to childhood. He explained that due to the mountainous terrain surrounding his village in the Congo, the community struggled to develop. They had a difficult time getting goods and services. One day at school, Michael and his classmates heard an unfamiliar noise and ran outside to see what it was. The noise was a passing motorbike in the distance, something the kids had never seen before. “There was not a motorbike in our village, so you can imagine. Even a car, I [first saw] a car while we were fleeing to Nairobi,” Michael said. Without roads in and out of the village, Michael’s home remained largely undeveloped throughout his childhood.

After experiencing the positive effects of development in Nairobi, Michael began to think about ways he could help his community back home. “To reach the rural areas is hard, which is why the government usually focuses on the urban areas. That’s why I want to pursue aeronautical engineering. So that I can make airplanes which can carry goods from other areas to our area, so our community can develop more. I want to change the community I came from.”

After years of hard work, he scored top of his class on the major final exam for Kenyan secondary school, earning him a place on the school’s Honor Roll and results worthy of university scholarships. Michael is currently seeking scholarships to pursue his dream career and help those in his village at home. Unfortunately, most scholarships in Kenya are reserved for citizens, making Michael ineligible. With this in mind, he’s eyeing colleges in the U.S. and beyond, but he’s open to any opportunity that will help him reach his goals. With a passion for aeronautics and ambitious goals to help his fellow Congolese citizens, Michael is not easily deterred. “I have the heart to go to university and change my life, and even change the lives of others,” he says.

Aside from grand goals to help his community, another driving factor for Michael is the health and happiness of his mother, father, and seven brothers and sisters. “Besides my career, the thing that I want to achieve in life is to help my family live a healthy life. [Since I was ten years old] I have not seen my family having a healthy life, enjoying life, having fun, because of the difficulties we have been passing through… I want to change my family and I want to change my community.”