For the past year, 15-year-old Karen Awuor (not her real name) has had a new daily ritual — taking antiretroviral (ARV) drugs. She discovered she was HIV positive during an unintended pregnancy that forced her to drop out of school; her baby died after just four months.
“When I was in class VII, I got into a relationship with one of my teachers; he promised to pay my school fees if I agreed to be his wife,” she says. “But when I got pregnant with his child and dropped out of school, he turned against me and behaved like he never knew me.”
Teacher-student relationships are not uncommon in Kenya’s south-western Nyanza province, where Awuor lives. Geoffrey Cherongis, Nyanza’s director of education, says sexual relationships between teachers and students are a threat to the health and future of the province’s girls, who make up almost 40 percent of students. “Some teachers are living with HIV and spread it to young girls, who hardly know what they are getting into,” he says. “It is even more complicated because parents, especially those in rural areas, support these affairs for perceived economic gain.”
According to Kenya’s Centre for the Study of Adolescence, Nyanza has one of the highest teen pregnancy rates in the country, as well as perhaps the highest school dropout ratio. Girls in Nyanza become sexually active at an average age of 16, compared to 19 in Nairobi province. Nyanza’s high HIV prevalence of 15.3 percent — twice the national average — makes them particularly vulnerable to HIV infection.
Extreme poverty seems to be the main reason why girls in Nyanza become sexually active at a young age. More than 60 percent of residents live on less than $1 (Rs.50) per day, and the region also has the largest number of children orphaned by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. “Poverty and high death rates, which orphan girls at an early age, make them want to get money by any means — not only to take care of themselves, but also to take care of their siblings,” laments Luke Opondo, Bondo district’s AIDS and sexually transmitted infections coordinator.
On the other hand, teachers are well-educated, earn a steady income and are often more affluent than most people in the provinces. Saulina Ondoro (65), a grandmother caring for five teenage orphans, says she would not discourage a sexual relationship between her grandchildren and anybody who could offer money to help her care for them. The material benefits of such relationships mean that girls who become sexually involved with their teachers are often admired by their schoolmates. “I get money and my peers in school respect me because dating a teacher is a big achievement for us girls,” says Viviane Aoko (14), who is having a sexual relationship with her married teacher.
Some male teachers complain that girls actively seek out relationships with them to raise their economic status. But Opondo says it is irresponsible of teachers to put the blame on students. “The claim by some teachers that these young girls seduce men does not wash, because these are teenagers, and they are adults who should act as their parents; a 45-year-old man cannot claim to be influenced by a 14-year-old girl.”
The ministry of education has an HIV/AIDS prevention and sex education curriculum that focuses on upper-primary and secondary schools, but does not address the issue of teacher-student relationships, leaving school heads to deal with it at their discretion. Moreover, a 2006 study by the Population Council, an international non-governmental research organisation, found that although Kenyan teachers are relatively well-educated, they are “confused or uninformed” about important aspects of HIV and AIDS.
(Excerpted and adapted from www.irinnews.org)