The rainy season in Kenya’s Great Rift Valley runs March through June and afternoon thunder showers can quickly turn dirt roads into mud and make them difficult to negotiate.

Wait long enough and they can just as quickly dry out and become drivable again.

Problem was, Edward Cheserek didn’t have any time to spare.

It was June and Cheserek, home for the weekend, had one day to get back to school for final exams — tests he needed to ace in order to receive a scholarship to St. Benedict’s Prep in New Jersey for the coming fall. It was the chance of a lifetime for a 16-year-old from a poor family of sheep and cattle farmers in the remote Kenyan village of Kapker.