Our Story
How It Began
Fr. Marty Holler, a retired priest from Ohio University and long time friend to Mike Shawver, has been helping St. Jude's rural Catholic school in Mweiga, Nyeri, Kenya since 2014. While at Ohio University, Fr. Marty met Ernest and Rosemary, two graduate students from Kenya. He married them and baptized their first child, thus starting this great relationship.
Ernest’s mother started St. Jude’s school and invited Fr. Marty to come and visit. He fell in love with the kids, teachers, and mission of St. Jude’s Catholic school and started making regular visits for 3 months at a time every year.
Mike Shawver and his family (wife Rosie and daughter Sofia) had been hearing stories about St. Jude’s for many years. Then finally they decided to make plans to visit the school in the summer of 2025.
Current Conditions
After 18 hours of flying from Los Angeles to London to Nairobi, Kenya and a 4-hour drive from Nairobi to Mweiga, ending with a 30 minute drive on a dirt and bumpy road, the Shawver family finally arrived at St. Jude’s school.
The dorms only have simple bunk beds and a foot locker for each student. There is no running water, so the kids take bucket showers. The kitchen is basically a wood burning fire pit and the kids do not get any meat and very little protein in their diet. The bathroom is only a hole in the ground with nothing to sit on and no toilet paper.
The classrooms are very simple and have a chalkboard as the main resource of instruction. There are very simple desks, but there are not enough desks for the kids. The teachers do have ipads and internet access, but there are not any projectors to share with the whole class.
In January of 2026, all students received brand new textbooks and the teachers received new teacher resources to accompany the textbooks, as a result of generous donations from the US.
Picture taken in Kenya of the children with their new textbooks.
The school has amazing kids and teachers who are so loving and positive, but needs a lot of help with facilities, classroom resources, food, and many other essentials. The Shawver family returned from their visit to Kenya moved with compassion and empathy to help improve the conditions for the kids at St. Jude’s. Mike started the Give Butter fundraising page in August of 2025 and started sharing the story of St. Jude’s with family and friends.
Now, we are committed to raising money to help improve the conditions and resources for the students and teachers at St. Jude’s Catholic school. Mike will be taking a group of 9 students from Loyola High School in LA, where he is a theology teacher, to visit St. Jude’s school in the summer of 2026.
We are truly inspired by the goodness and positivity of the students and teachers at St. Jude’s Catholic school. Together we can all help with our generous donations to give them the resources and support that they need to succeed. Any help you can offer will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for your continued prayers, support, and generosity! God bless!
Why Did We Start This Foundation?
