John Randtke, Kansas University senior, is, at age 22, the youngest board member of Teach My Kenyan Children.

He learned about the organization through Peter Gitau, who was then headmaster at Veritas Christian School.

He went to Kenya after his high school graduation in the summer of 2003.

“People with goats hanging out of their cars – that was the first thing I was faced with,” he said.

He said many of the students’ parents traveled three or four hours to the Nairobi airport to meet them.

Many of them had never visited Nairobi before.

“This is a rural community, out in the middle of nowhere,” he said.

Randtke prides himself on his flexibility to adapt to other cultures, but some aspects of Kenyan life took him by surprise.

“The bathrooms were kind of hard to get used to – it was one of those squat holes with a little rectangle slot,” he said. “No toilet paper provided.”

His most difficult experience was passing through the slums of Nairobi.

“Probably one of the hardest things … over the first year was running around with money for TMKC projects, and there are kids on the side of the road, begging for money,” he said. “Just having to run on past them – that was the hardest thing I had to do.”

Randtke, who is taking his second semester of Swahili, plans to graduate this summer from KU with a mechanical engineering degree.

He plans to return to Kenya for the fall term to teach physics, mathematics and technical assistance – computer maintenance and repair – at a secondary girls’ school in Nairobi.

“Now that there is possibility for moving on to the future with a higher education (and a) good job, students there are extremely motivated,” he said.

As to future plans for the organization, Randtke said nothing had been finalized yet.

“I’d love to see other organizations – Teach My Ugandan Children – start up.”