The Hope Gateway Education Center

Arizona-based financial advisor Darcy Bergen supports the work of Bergen’s Mission, a charitable organization dedicated to improving the quality of life for people in East Africa. Darcy Bergen serves as the charity’s treasurer. The organization is a longtime partner of the Canadian nonprofit, Hope for the Nations.

To address a lack of access to education, Hope for the Nations established the Hope Gateway Education Center in the Sinai neighborhood of one of the Nairobi's biggest slums. Home to more than 200,000 people, Sinai has no public school system. Families must pay for private school if they want to educate their children. 

To help break the cycle of illiteracy and poverty, Hope for the Nations partnered with a local agency to establish the Hope Gateway Education Center in 2005. More than 200 elementary school children attend the center at no cost. 

Every pupil also receives two healthy meals and free school uniforms. With the help of high school students from British Columbia, the center was able to install an on-site pumping system to ensure that students have access to clean water.