The programme has established three primary school after care centres (in Hamburg, Lovers Twist and Mgababa) which now also house a pre-school and a nursery in the mornings. The Trust is currently providing daily food for over 430 children in the after-care centres, crèche and nursery. The number of children benefitting from the programme has doubled in the past year which has meant that the funding needs of the programme have increased dramatically due to staff, food, equipment and other needs.

All three centres now stay open for the school holidays as children are more in need of nutritional support when they are not getting their daily school meals. Each holiday, a common thematic holiday programme is planned for all three centres. This June/July holiday has focused on the World Cup : the participating countries, star players, national flags, world maps and South African national symbols and anthem.

The Trust was fortunate in receiving a large grant from the D G Murray Trust, which has made much of the work and progress of the past year possible. The Starfish Greathearts’ Foundation has provided much needed support for carer stipends, food parcels and school uniforms. The faith-based Washington DC organisation 25:40 has generously supported the OVC feeding programme and funded the establishment of the nursery care facility at Mgababa. The education programme also benefitted from the funds raised by the KidzPositive “Pedalling for Peddie” event which entailed a team of doctors from Cape Town cycling from Hamburg to Cape Town to raise funds for the Trust’s work.

Hamburg Primary School after-care centre

The co-ordinator is Veliswa Mancangwana, a qualified teacher, who is assisted by Faith Mapuma and Norih Xhadi. Noyolo Solwandle works part-time as a cleaner attending to the primary school toilets and the after-care rooms. She also trains and manages the traditional dance group consisting of 12 girls who regularly perform at Hamburg events. The centre is now providing hot meals three times a week and sandwiches on two days. This centre has a stronger remedial education focus than the others and has been provided with valuable assistance and materials by Bertha Tiemstra (teacher trainer from Canada) and Pat Thomas (remedial teacher and book fanatic from the USA).

Eva Centre: Lovers Twist

The Eva centre continues to be very efficiently run by Nomathemba Ngqondi. The community started a small crèche/pre-school at the centre in the mornings and this has now been absorbed into the Trust’s OVC programme. Starfish Foundation is funding stipends of the two carers dedicated to the crèche. The centre has a huge flourishing garden which provides large amounts of fresh produce for the feeding scheme. The centre now has electricity and a water connection. However the water supply is non-functional more often than not due to problems with the water supply to the whole Lovers Twist area.

Bjorn Centre: Mgababa

The progress at the centre has been very exciting. It has grown from little more than a daily feeding scheme in a run down building. The building has been completely repaired and equipped, new carers have been employed and the number of children benefitting from the services provided has almost doubled. The finishing touches have excited the whole community – a series of wonderful murals painted by Xabiso Tokota, a talented young man from the area.

Educational resources and play equipment are gradually being built up, and the centre has established a more formal relationship with the local primary school in terms of referral of children with learning or development problems. The centre has recently planted its first batch of vegetable seeds in the newly created vegetable garden, and has dug and built an additional outside pit-toilet.

The Mgababa community approached the education programme to set up a nursery for children from the age of 1 to 3 years. The community is very poor with serious social and health problems. There are numerous small children on ARV’s whose families are unable to feed them adequately enough to support their treatment regimes. A funding application was submitted to 25:40 who agreed to fund the set-up costs for the nursery and are continuing to fund the running costs. It now has over 30 children attending regularly. A community volunteer has joined the staff as two carers are overstretched caring for so many small children. The after-care staff also assist with the cooking and caring in the mornings.

The Way Forward

The Education Programme’s strategic plan in the OVC context is to continue to reach more children in the areas where the current centres are situated and to improve the support and facilities provided to those children who are already benefitting from the programme. Plans for 2011 include starting on the establishment of an OVC after-care programme at the Bodiam primary school. The plan is to establish additional centres once each new centre has been established and is running well.