Local Spring Selected work Embrace a Street Child
Case study · Non-profit · Nairobi, Kenya
A new website and simpler publishing for Embrace a Street Child
I rebuilt the ministry’s website with dedicated programme pages and an AI-assisted publishing workflow. Nairobi staff send text and photos; drafts are reviewed before publication. All work is provided free of charge.
01 Results
What the rebuild changed
- $0
- Invoiced to the ministry the rebuild and everything since, free of charge
- 0
- Dashboards the team has to learn an update starts as a message from Nairobi
- 0.4 s
- Homepage load time measured on the live site, 24 requests
- 11
- Stories and updates on the site four posts existed when the rebuild started
No page-speed comparison is offered here: the old site only survives in the Internet Archive, so timing the two against each other would measure the archive, not the ministry's old host. Everything else can be checked against the live site and the archive's captures of the old one. 1
The project
- Client
- Embrace a Street Child - a Gospel-centred ministry for street-connected boys
- Where
- Nairobi Centre, Kenya, with supporters in Canada and the United States
- Before
- A WordPress site on an off-the-shelf theme, replaced at launch in June 2026
- Build
- A custom static build, rebuilt from scratch and launched in June 2026
- Publishing
- Staff send text and photographs; an AI workflow drafts and publishes
- Fee
- None - built and maintained free of charge
- My involvement
- Helped organise the first Reconnect Camp in 2024, and served on the 2026 Canadian team for IT and media while playing in the worship band
- Live site
- embraceastreetchild.org
What I did
- Rebuilt from scratch Structure, layout and visual language
- Platform migration Off a stock theme onto a custom build
- Content architecture Separate pages for programmes, the centre, camps and stories
- AI publishing workflow Staff send text and photos for each update
- Contact form Enquiries to a messenger and an inbox
- Spam protection Scored, so real messages still get through
- Photo pipeline Pictures from the Kenyan team, sized for the web
- Image ethics Written rules for photographing children
- Search and structured data NGO schema, sitemaps and social cards
- Testimony pages Two full stories, published with the ministry's approval
- Handover Staff can submit and review updates
02 The brief
The brief
The brief: explain the ministry clearly and make regular updates easier for a small team in Nairobi and Canada.
03 What changed
Before and after
Each pair below is the same job on the old site and the new one. Select any screenshot to open it full size.
01Homepage
A homepage that explains the ministry
The homepage introduces the ministry, its location and purpose, with clear links to learn more or get involved.
02About
The ministry’s history and team
The story now follows Kitale in 2014, the centre in 2015 and Nairobi in 2021, with dedicated team and programme pages.
03Updates
An organised updates page
Newsletters, testimonies and everyday updates have clear categories, dates, summaries and cover images.
04Get involved
Four ways to support the ministry
Four ways to help: pray, give, visit or serve, and stay connected.
05Contact
Contact forms with a clear purpose
The form identifies prayer, partnership and visit enquiries so the team has context before replying.
Pages the ministry did not have before
-
After - the four-step pathway
-
After - the Nairobi centre
-
After - a boy’s own story
-
After - a newsletter as a page
Mobile views
-
Before · on a phone
-
After · on a phone
04 Publishing
How staff publish updates
Staff send their news through familiar tools. The workflow turns it into a consistent draft for review.
- Sent, not typed
An update starts as a message
Staff in Nairobi send text and photographs through familiar chats, documents or shared folders.
- Drafted
Draft preparation and formatting
The workflow prepares titles, dates, summaries, images, alt text and consistent formatting.
- Checked
A person still approves the wording
Every draft is reviewed before publication, with particular care for children’s stories.
- Live in minutes
Approved updates are published
Approved content triggers a fresh site build, without a CMS login or plugin updates.
05 Photographs
Consent and care in photography
Photography follows explicit consent and dignity rules, especially for children’s stories.
- Consent first
Identifiable photographs only where permission exists
A child’s face is published only with permission confirmed by the ministry.
- Dignity
No rescue or street-life imagery used for effect
Stories focus on recovery and dignity, without exploiting distress for fundraising.
- When it is unclear
Use non-identifying images when needed
Without confirmed consent, use non-identifying imagery or omit the photograph.
- One-off stays one-off
Permission is specific to each use
Permission for a testimony photo applies only to that story, not to reuse elsewhere.
Testimonies focus on recovery and are published with the ministry’s approval.
06 Beyond the site
Forms, search and media
Connected enquiries, social updates and image handling support the publishing workflow.
- Enquiries
Enquiries sent to the team
Spam-filtered enquiries reach both the team’s messenger and email.
- Findable
Structured data and social cards
Structured information identifies the Nairobi ministry; preview cards make shared links clear.
- Daily life
Instagram updates on the website
Instagram feeds bring recent moments onto the updates and contact pages.
- Photographs
Shared photo uploads
A shared photo folder feeds an image workflow that sizes, optimises and describes each asset.
07 Free of charge
Free website support
The rebuild, publishing workflow and ongoing support are provided free of charge.
Paid Local Spring projects help fund this continuing work. 2
I helped organise Reconnect Camp in 2024 and served on the Canadian IT, media and worship team in 2026.
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Notes
- Where the “before” screenshots come from. The old site was replaced at the migration, so it no longer exists on the ministry's host. Every “before” shot on this page is the Internet Archive's capture of embraceastreetchild.org, taken in August and September 2025 and rendered in the same browser, at the same window size, as the “after” shots. That is also why no speed comparison is offered: an archived page is served by the archive. The “four posts” figure is the count of posts in the old site's own sitemap in its last capture; “eleven stories and updates” is the count of update and testimony pages in the live site's sitemap today. The homepage load time is the live site's own load event, measured on a desktop connection. ↩
- What “free of charge” covers. Design, build, migration, the publishing workflow, the contact and spam setup, and the ongoing changes since launch. The ministry pays its own domain and its own hosting bill, which it would have paid anyway and which nobody should be dependent on me for. Non-profit work like this is limited by how much paid work there is - it is not an open offer, and it is not a discount programme. ↩