Spotlight on John Khaguli
Read a long-form piece on John Khaguli, a young man who left life in Mukuru slums to live and learn at the Dorothy Schwartz Community Center. He is now a college graduate, on his way to becoming a Psychologist.
By Ava Fisherman, LWCF Volunteer
Fall 2025 Newsletter Update
On November 7th, 2025, John Khaguli did what very few kids from Mukuru slums in Nairobi, Kenya, get to do: he graduated college. The time lag of an overseas zoom call could not hide his proud smile, nor the excitement in his voice when he told me, several weeks prior, that he was about to hit a milestone that had once never even seemed like an option for him.
John, who was born in November, 2001, was born and raised in Mukuru slums—one of the largest collections of slums in Nairobi. Although both of his parents were in good health at the time of his birth, John’s father left his mother before John had the chance to know him. Left alone to support her son in a ramshackle house with little money or resources, John’s mother struggled to provide for him, often working long hours away from home washing other people’s clothes. John spent most of his childhood left alone, living off of porridge rations and waiting for his mother to return, hopefully with food. Much of the time she came back empty-handed. The pressure, John says, was so intense that his mother experienced a severe mental health crisis, and had to be admitted to a government-run psych hospital when John was ten years old.
John’s mother was his sole provider, the only person he really knew. Without her, and without a safe home to return to, he was turned out onto the streets, forced to sift through garbage for resources and quench the temptation to steal. “If you didn’t get food that day, you slept on an empty stomach,” he says simply over the phone, “I just persevered.”
This life of constant struggle continued for four years until his luck took a massive turn. One day, while washing cars to earn a little money, a customer gave him five dollars, which was a lot; John was taken aback, overjoyed at the prospect of food that the money promised. The next day, the same man returned. He told John his name was Isaac Okumu, and he was the Board Chairman of a foundation called the Living Water Children’s Fund. Isaac presented John with an opportunity: a spot at the Dorothy Schwartz Community Center, where John would receive housing, food, and, for the first time ever, a formal education. He would no longer have to live alone on the streets, would no longer go hungry. A sponsor in the U.S. would pay to support his life and schooling. John said yes.
“It was perfect,” he tells me with a broad smile on our zoom call. “I grew up there. At least I could study; I’d never been to school, I just called myself a genius.” At age fourteen, John joined the “baby classes” to learn curriculum basics, but in the span of only a few months began skipping up grade levels, eventually graduating in the top four of his class. Dedicated to his studies and determined to keep working hard, his successes didn’t end there. With an unstoppable personal drive and the help of continued sponsorship through LWCF, John went on to specialize in clinical psychology at St. Paul’s University, a chartered university near Nairobi. And this past November, to the delight of his friends, teachers and himself, he graduated.
The next steps for John revolve around his desire to help others and give back to the community. This means completing the licensing process and an internship at a mental health facility, after which he will become a fully certified psychologist.
When I ask John what his career goals are, I am surprised at first to hear that he wants to return to Mukuru slums, a place that holds so much hurt and heartbreak for him. In one of our emails he writes, “Mukuru has been my home and I’ve seen and experienced different types of trauma there. I don’t want any child to grow up carrying those scars unnecessarily. My plan is to provide psychotherapy to children who are often unaware that what they’ve gone through is trauma, to reduce the impact of domestic violence, and to run mental health awareness programs. Ultimately I want to help end the cycle of trauma and support healthier childhood development in the community.”
John does not look or sound like a person brought down by the significant hardships thrust upon him from a young age. Rather than being hardened by these things, they have made him stronger. He has allowed them to inform his life path, choosing to use his experience as a motivator to provide aid for others. An extraordinary amount of kindness, compassion, and humor radiates from him, even through the lackluster modes of electronic communication that enables our conversations. He is living his life: going for runs in the morning, hanging out with friends, and constructing mental health and social impact programs. On top of all this, or perhaps because of it, he writes. He writes books and stories, scenes from his life, ruminations on inspiration and struggle, prose that draws a poignant beauty from the most difficult moments of his life. When I ask him about his forthcoming book, Unbroken, he tells me, “It’s about survival, and finding beauty in brokenness. The way laughter still finds its way through rusted iron roofs, and love still blooms between dusty streets and chaos. Writing it sometimes feels heavy, but it’s real and that makes it worth it.” Unbroken is a massive undertaking; as is the case with everything John sets his mind to, it will be a work of great passion, dedication, and resilience.
Every child deserves a chance ❤️
Thanks to generous donations Living Water Children’s Fund has been able to help students like John receive the support to continue to access educational opportunities.
Please consider donating to support Dorothy Schwartz Community Centre to help other students from the Mukuru slum in Nairobi, Kenya. Any gift, big or small, helps us on our mission to make sure children have their basic needs met so that they may flourish and grow.
