The City of Parkville hosted Coro Kansas City intern Humphrey Musila during the week of July 5.
Coro is an organization begun in San Francisco in 1942 by W. Donald Fletcher, an attorney, and Van Duyn Dodge, an investment counselor, to train young veterans in the leadership skills necessary to assure that our democratic system of government could more effectively meet the needs of its citizens.
Coro Kansas City is designed to develop future community leaders through exposure to community issues, leadership development, civic leaders and organizations. It is a demanding full-time internship that requires a significant interest in public affairs. A Coro Kansas City intern is assigned a week-long professional placement in each of the following four workforce sectors: business, government, labor, and nonprofit management.
Participants are immersed in these sectors, allowing them to learn experientially with some of Kansas City’s most effective leaders and establish significant professional contacts.
Makueni County Youth Organization Before coming to study in the United States, Humphrey Musila was the Founder and Director of a community based youth organization by the name Makueni County Youth Organization (MACOYO) based in the county of Makueni in the Eastern part of Kenya.
During that period Humphrey was involved with different activities of youth empowerment with an emphasis on education. As part of the MACOYO program, Humphrey opened the first library in his home village in the year 2012. Despite being many miles away from his home country of Kenya, Humphrey feels that as a young leader he has a responsibility to build a better Kenya for everyone.
Book Donation Program After arriving at Park University in January 2013, Humphrey quickly saw an opportunity to collect donated books that will go to Kenya to help students and educators. The program, which began in October 2014, encouraged students, faculty, and community members to donate anything from college textbooks to children’s books. Humphrey said, “I saw it as an opportunity to give back to my community back in Kenya.
Currently I have received a donation of over 5,000 books, printers and other stationery and the challenge remains to ship the books to Kenya.” Humphrey mentioned, “That the books will go to different counties in Kenya and some will go to my library. I plan to launch another phase of book collection in the near future.”
African Tutor Humphrey didn’t stop with the book collection program. He also started a social enterprise called “African Tutor”. African Tutor’s goal is to assist student academics and provide tutor jobs for graduates.
African Tutor’s vision is to introduce “mobile libraries” that will ensure all students, despite their backgrounds, will have equal access to books and other resources. The mobile libraries will seek to improve the academic status of African school going children and create a culture of education in Africa.
Humphrey proudly states, “As the founder of this social enterprise I look forward at initiating solutions to the many challenges faced by young people across Africa today.” African Tutor can be found at www.theafricantutor.com
City of Parkville Humphreys’ Government week placement was with the City of Parkville; he gained invaluable experiences through exposure to community issues, leadership development, and contact with civic leaders. He attended several public meetings and held interviews with the city staff. Additionally, Humphrey did a ride-along with the Parkville Police Department to compare and contrast differences between police in his home country of Kenya and the United States. Humphrey stated “I hope to return to Kenya and advocate for police reforms in my home country.”
To contact Humphrey with any questions, email him at Humphrey.Musila@park.edu