A 99-year-old woman, believed to be the world’s oldest primary school pupil, has died peacefully at home in Kenya, her grandson told media on Saturday.
Priscilla Sitienei started developing health complications after attending class on Wednesday. She had been preparing for final exams set to start next week, the report said.
Priscilla Sitienei, who grew up in a Kenya occupied by the British and lived through her country’s struggle for independence, inspired a film and praise from the UNESCO.
“I wanted to show an example not only to them but to other girls around the world who are not in school, without education, there will be no difference between you and a chicken,” Priscilla Sitienei told UNESCO.
Priscilla Sitienei joined Leaders Vision Preparatory School in 2010, but also served her village of Ndalat in the Rift Valley as a midwife for more than 65 years. She even helped deliver some of her own classmates, who were then aged between 10 and 14.
Affectionately known as “Gogo”- meaning grandmother in Kalenjin language- Priscilla Sitienei told BBC in 2015 that she was finally learning to read and write as she never had that opportunity as a child.
“They tell me they are too old. I tell them: ‘Well I am at school and so should you.’ I see children who are lost, children who are without fathers, just going round and round, hopeless. I want to inspire them to go to school,” Priscilla Sitienei said.
