Meet the Students: Claudine

“We learn not just skills but how to have the confidence to pursue impossible things!”

—Claudine Kabihogo, Entrepreneurship, Class of 2015

I was born in Rwanda in 1992, the youngest of eight children — seven girls and one boy. We all loved playing together and with the other village kids until we almost forget to eat! I don’t remember the genocide because I was only two years old at the time, but my family lived. My aunt, her husband, and their six children all died, as did a lot of people my family knew.

In 1998 I went to live with my grandmother in a different village so I could attend school. My daddy made sure to pay my school fees. But when I got to high school he got sick with cancer and it became more difficult to pay. I found an NGO that helped me pay for school until I graduated in 2011. By that time, my daddy had passed away, so I could not find a way to pay for university. I spent a year at home after daddy was gone feeling very sad and aimless.

Now I am a student here and the only one of my seven siblings to attend college.

One day I attended a training at an American NGO called Akazi Kanoze. That’s where I heard about Akilah. Now I am a student here and the only one of my seven siblings to attend college. I am also the only one of anyone I know who is in such a unique college where we learn not just skills but how to have the confidence to pursue impossible things!

One of the best memories I have from Akilah is the day in Foundation Year when each of us met our big sisters from the class above us. It was so good for us to be paired with girls like us that we could look up to. They seemed so much more confident and experienced than us. We knew if we worked hard we could be like that, too.

They seemed so much more confident and experienced than us. We knew if we worked hard we could be like that, too.

I also remember the first time I had to stand up and present something to my class. I had to do it in English and when I came here, I barely knew English. We are all proud of ourselves for the first time we were able to stand up and say something in English. For most of us, it was the first time ever. It was terrifying and it was a great achievement.

My advice to future Akilah students is to always respect themselves because that is how they can be respectful towards others. Respect begets respect, just like kindness begets kindness. And also, when working towards a goal, stay active and keep at it. No one else will achieve your goals for you so you cannot afford to give up or slow down.

If you wish to support an Akilah student like Claudine, please visit our donate page.