Education in Pastoralist Communities in Kenya

Cheryl Doss, Yale University

Pastoralist communities in Northern Kenya are faced with a number of challenges, from drought and weather shocks, violence, wide fluctuations in market prices for livestock, and increasing threats from HIV/AIDS. Using a unique data set, we follow 180 pastoralist households for two years through a drought and recovery period. Although some sectors of the pastoralist community remain viable, many people are leaving the pastoralist system. Preliminary analysis suggests that education is a key factor in people being able to successfully diversify their incomes to sources beyond livestock. In this paper, we explore the patterns of education among members of the pastoralist community and examine the impacts of the drought on education patterns. We can examine this both before and after the drought shock changed herd composition. In addition, we analyze whose animals were sold to pay for school fees, which allows us to look at both outcomes and processes.