At Federal Way-based AYDEPI, public safety is achieved through community and youth leadership.

Through volunteer projects restoring parks in Federal Way to events like the upcoming 3rd annual Beauty of our African Roots event on Aug. 23, AYDEPI’s programs focus on empowering the next generation of youth to become the mentors they need.

AYDEPI stands for African Young Dreamers Empowerment Programs International and was founded by Beatrice Kiraguri and her daughter Fiona Okech in 2019.

Kiraguri is more likely to share the stage with a youth leader than to speak herself.

“I keep on saying, telling the community and the leaders that we need to give the microphone to the youth,” Kiraguri said.

Since 2019, she has worked weekends, nights and more to create the organization and to keep it funded.

For her work to improve the well-being and safety of Federal Way through connecting with and empowering youth, Beatrice Kiraguri is the Mirror’s Hometown Hero for July.

Beatrice Kiraguri

Founder of Black Equality Coalition Anthony Curtis called AYDEPI “probably the best youth program in Washington state.”

“It really displays youth excellence, community excellence, leadership…and really creates pathways for our youth to grow to lead and to become successful, academically, personally, professionally,” Curtis said.

Both AYDEPI and Curtis’ organization are now based at the Family Life Center in Federal Way, along with other organizations doing good work in the community.

AYDEPI stands out because the organization, and Kiraguri in particular, have “created a platform for leaders like myself to come and really instill my knowledge and wisdom,” Curtis said.

Curtis highlighted how important this platform is, sharing that he actually had somebody ask him recently where they can connect with youth who need help.

“Without the platform, you don’t find the youth,” Curtis said. “She not only has them, but they’re engaged, they’re learning, they’re growing, they’re respectful, they’re leaders and they’re courageous.”

Before moving to the United States from Kenya, Kiraguri had decades of experience with nonprofit work, including working for 10 years at the Kenya Network of Women with AIDS (KENWA).

“My mom had always wanted to work with youth,” daughter Fiona Okech said. When several tragedies struck within their community in 2016, they decided to work together to make a difference.

“I experienced my friends passing away, or going to drugs and alcohol, just engaging themselves with negative social behavior,” Okech said.

Youth Director of African Young Dreamers Empowerment Programs International (AYDEPI) Fiona Okech gets cheered on by community as she celebrates graduating college at the AYDEPI graduate celebration event on June 28, 2025. Photo by Bruce Honda

She also knew what it felt like to “be new person in a new place where you feel like you’re judged…where you just fear talking, because you just feel like what are they going to say about you?”

Kiraguri used her expertise in nonprofit work to begin the project with a needs assessment. This told them that what could really save lives in Federal Way would be to give youth a voice and connection to community — and safe spaces to spend their time outside of school.

When young people in the city feel isolated and unheard, many turn to social media and older peers for ways to feel seen and powerful, and that can lead to negative behaviors, youth leaders at AYDEPI told the Mirror.

“Kids need not only just parent involvement, but a safe space to talk about their struggles… sometimes [they] just mask behind posting about guns…because they don’t feel like there’s another way that they can be strong,” youth leader Owate Benea explained.

Getting involved in FW

AYDEPI provides many pathways to connection and leadership to replace these negative influences, many of which also make the city of Federal Way even more beautiful as a whole.

As just one example, 50 youth from AYDEPI joined with We Love Our City to help with native plant restoration projects at Celebration Park and Steel Lake Park in the city for the recent City Serve Day.

AYDEPI often runs environmental projects like that one as well as soccer camps, mentorship programs, dances and culturally specific youth groups. Youth leaders run most of these programs with support from Kiraguri and others and are even involved in public service in other ways, like a current project to help King County Metro collect survey responses to get feedback about proposed changes to bus routes in Federal Way.

Dancers at the AYDEPI event on June 29. Photo by Bruce Honda

Youth leaders also speak at local events, learn how to apply for grants and manage budgets for the organization, mentor other youth and more.

The organization currently serves at least 400 youth — and would serve more if funding allowed.

Much of Kiraguri’s time is spent chasing grant funding and managing the finances of the organization, an exhausting process that often leaves little room for much else.

“Sometimes I don’t even understand why I’m working on Saturdays and Sundays and at night, but I’m doing it for the society, for the community, because if you don’t do it…I have to get resources. Sometimes I don’t even sleep,” Kiraguri said.

It’s the youth that motivate her to keep going, especially those who they aren’t able to reach — like the kids she’s seen dying from gun violence who she says are the ones who needed spaces like AYDEPI.

“We needed the space so that we can bring all those kids together,” Kiraguri said.

‘We have to be there for them’

As just one example, their South Sudanese group can right now only incorporate about 20 students, “but that means 100 or maybe 140 students that we are not going to remove from the street,” Kiraguri explained.

“I see the cities and county budget and I’m like…we don’t need guns, we don’t need policemen. We need those places…I believe that we can be able to change the mindset of the young people, but we have to be there for them,” she said.

The isolation that drives negative behaviors comes from many places, especially the influence of social media, peer pressure, and a lack of understanding from adults.

These pressures are amplified when youth are navigating other challenges, like adapting to a new place, dealing with mental health issues or rigid family expectations.

When Trina Wamunyu first moved to the United Stated from Kenya in 2018, she said her first year was “very isolating, because I was in a new school with a lot of different cultures that I really didn’t know about,” but after finding AYDEPI, she “started talking to the adults and the little kids and being able to even mentor people I don’t even know…that’s when I actually found that close knit community that I had in Kenya.”

Another factor that can cause these challenges is that parents can be “very disconnected,” Kiraguri said. “The parents working so hard 24/7 so they don’t even know where these kids go to. In the summertime, parents are working 16 hours, more than 16 hours, so they really barely see their kids. So what happens inside in the afternoon…the parents don’t even know.”

Older youth volunteers helped younger ones to water native plants that were planted at past AYDEPI events. Photo by Keelin Everly-Lang / The Mirror

Youth leader Medichael Mereste is from Haiti and said he’s also noticed how young people here often connect online through video games or social media but don’t know how to connect in person, in contrast to his experiences in Haiti where this was less of a problem.

Parent Lilian Mburu said she’s seen her kids get more confident since the program and that she sees the problems the youth describe too.

“There’s a lot of seclusion, like they did a whole soccer program, and I bet you money, they don’t even know their names,” Mburu said, who has several children who participated.

One of the issues is the lack of safe spaces for them to spend time together, Mburu said. “They can’t chill because food costs money, it costs gas, it costs all of this.”

Kiraguri spoke to the importance of getting kids together to do activities in order to help them learn about themselves.

“There’s a lot of hidden talents, and you can only find out what they love most when they are together,” Kiraguri said, with the recent soccer program as an example.

Benea already had plenty of leadership experience from her role as ASB president and other activities, but said that AYDEPI has enriched her understanding.

She’s learned that “to actually be a leader, you have to understand the demographic that you’re helping…a lot of kids that we’re helping, they come from low income families are immigrants, and it’s like if you can’t understand the people that you’re helping, you’re not helping them at all.”

Wamunyu said she has learned a lot about being a leader through AYDEPI, especiallly as someone who wouldn’t typically be someone to volunteer herself for things.

“It’s just taking that initiative and actually following through with it. Because a lot of people there, they start projects, but they don’t really finish….what a leader does, is staying true to your word,” Wamunyu said.

“‘I’ve learned many things…confidence, to not be afraid, to step up when needed. That’s something I was really working on,” Mereste said. “When I get to AYDEPI, I learned that you don’t have to be afraid…they don’t judge who you are. No matter what you can do, they don’t judge you.”

Looking to the future and especially during election season, Kiraguri said she hopes to see more support from the city, especially because they talk so much about public safety.

“We do it for the sake of ourselves, for the sake of the youth, and for the sake of the community,” Kiraguri said. “We do a lot supporting the city” but “we feel unsupported by the city.”

Youth leader Sincyre Bell said “as a city leader, they should see that we are trying our hardest to make it helpful for these kids” but that often they only look at them “when it’s like already too late.”

“They need to see us and support us…we’re doing it for your city, but not only just for a certain group or demographic, but also for us all,” Bell said.

AYDEPI youth gather to celebrate one member’s birthday with cake at the volunteer event. Photo by Keelin Everly-Lang / The Mirror

Fathers Dias Mobula and Bekmay Kayembe in a conversation with the next generation after the day’s environmental work has been completed. Photo by Keelin Everly-Lang / The Mirror