Ndung’u Nyoro
Ndung’u Nyoro is a Kenyan social entrepreneur who has turned crowdsourcing into a lifeline for bright, needy learners. In 2017 he founded the Affecto Foundation and its flagship programme, Watoto Wasome (“Let the Children Study”), after a Facebook appeal raised a year’s fees for a girl from Nyandarua in under an hour. Since then he has mobilised online donors to sponsor more than 2,400 students from all 47 counties, paying tuition, buying laptops, and supplying complete uniforms.
Affecto’s Kabati Learning Centre in Murang’a hosts weekend tutoring, counselling, and coding classes, creating a safe hub every holiday. During the COVID-19 shutdown he negotiated subsidised data bundles with Safaricom and delivered printed worksheets to remote villages, ensuring no scholar fell behind. His wider “Digital Goodness” drives have cleared hospital bills, rebuilt flood-ruined homes, and stocked community libraries.
Nyoro’s impact has earned the 2022 Head of State Commendation, a 2023 UN SDG Young Leader finalist citation, and the 2024 Starbrands East Africa Education Philanthropist of the Year award. Guided by the mantra “each one teach one,” he is now piloting an ed-tech app to crowd-fund micro-scholarships in real time and aims to enrol 10,000 learners by 2030.