Maureen Swai’s legacy of quality early education

Mrs Maureen Swai.
For Nairobians seeking a good private pre-school for their children, one name that is sure to come up is Msingi Bora Kindergarten.
It is in such high demand that, at some point, mothers would book a slot in advance for their unborn children.
The school is neither high-cost adopting an international curriculum, nor one focusing on the Kenyan CBC. Its system is a unique blend, allowing children to be sent to schools with any system for onward education.
Mrs Maureen Swai, who founded the school alongside her husband John in 1974, was at pains to explain her winning formula. She would confess that the “Msingi system” was largely of her own creation – based on her training, teaching experiences and the recognition that little children need to play, sing and have fun.
Unlike most pre-schools, where children are introduced to reading and writing at age three, Msingi Bora learners start writing at age five, and teachers do not give homework. This “playful” approach to learning can be alarming for parents. Mrs Swai reassured them that it would eventually pay off.
Msingi Bora Kindergarten was set up in a converted residential house just off Muthithi Road, Westlands. The first intake was about a dozen children, including Mrs Swai’s own and the children of friends and kin.
With time, a second house close by was converted into “big school” for the older children.
The couple ran the school like business partners, with Mr Swai handling the administration and finances side of things, while Mrs Swai focused on learning.
Later, the school moved to better structured premises on Denis Pritt Road, before shifting to the current “permanent” location in Karen. Mr Swai died in 2011.
Msingi Bora means “good foundation” in Kiswahili. The school has flourished, its popularity and reputation a consequence of the care and attention the Swais and the Msingi staff took to ensure every child received a great foundation to continue their educational journey.
Mrs Swai died in Switzerland last month, barely two years shy of the school’s 50th anniversary. She was born on May 5, 1938 in Motherwell, Scotland, to Hugh and Ann Mollahan. She was christened Mary Esther, but her parents always called her Maureen.
She was the eldest of six Mollahan children who were spaced out over 13 years.
In addition to drawing, painting and craftwork, she made many of her clothes and had portfolios of outfits she designed. As a girl, she was a member of the local church choir.
Her family says perhaps it was the experience of looking after her younger siblings that provided the motivation to focus on early childhood education.
In 1956, she enrolled at Craiglockhart Catholic College of Education in Edinburgh. After qualifying as a teacher, Maureen moved to Glasgow.
During weekends, she and her friends would go to university dances. It is at one of these dances that she met an engineering student from Kenya; John Christopher Swai. They were married in Glasgow in 1966.
In the early 1970s, John returned to Kenya and Maureen followed with her young family.
Not happy with the education her children were getting, she set up an early year’s school to teach them herself. That’s how Msingi Bora Kindergarten came to be.