Profile: Moses Kiyendeye

Moses Kiyendeye is 27 years old and has been the full time English teacher at the Learning Centre since August 2007.

Moses was born in southern Rwanda but had to leave his village at the time of the genocide.

Moses is following in the footsteps of his father, who was also a teacher. Moses now lives with his brother's three children in Kigali.

He completed secondary school and is now studying Management and Finance at the School of Finance and Banking in Kigali in the evenings.  Moses has always had a talent for English and prior to teaching English at the Learning Centre he was an English translator for ten years. We know we are lucky to have found him.

Since he began teaching, Moses has worked hard to make the LC a place of serious academic study. When we visited him in May 2008, we were struck by the students’ significant progress in written, speaking and listening English since we were there last year. In recent written and oral examinations, some students in the intermediate English class were achieving marks as high as 92%, 94% - with one excellent student gaining 100%.

Moses not only helps the 50 dedicated LC students improve their English, but he also acts as their pastoral carer and friend, giving advice and emotional support. Moses often visits the students, most of whom are genocide orphans, at home and rings them if they do not come to class to find out if they are sick. This helps foster a trusting and enjoyable atmosphere, conducive to hard work, but also necessary for pupils to continue with their studies. 

Commenting on the LC’s growth and success, Moses told us,

‘To start is always difficult, but with perseverance, objectives, goals and plans, control and vision the end result has been so fruitful!’

A measure of this success is that many students want to gain recognised English qualifications and to become English teachers, something Rwanda desperately needs, given that 80% of teachers died in the genocide. The credit for motivating and enthusing our students goes to Moses, to whom Network for Africa gives an enormous thank you.