By Harrison Nash | Charity Director / Project Leader
Firstly I would like to extend a heartfelt thanks to all our supporters through Global Giving! Whilst we are sorry for taking a long time to update you all just know that we have been working tirelessly behind the scenes to ensure we are providing effective service delivery for the children we support! And at this stage it remains crucial for us to strengthen our fundraising activity as much as possible! You can also visit our new charity website which we continue to be incredible proud of!
We have of course been continuing in trying to raise funds for 2015 to ensure the children can again be enrolled into schools. We recently purchased new uniform and stationery requirements as needed which is always a significant expense. As I write this update we currently have 32 children attending a number of 13 different educational establishments! Of course we still need to ensure that the monthly fees of the children are met, particularly when we have children requiring specialist support!
Thanks to YOUR support we have also been able to continue our commitment to providing group Occupational Therapy at Siyakatala. We have just arranged new assessments and are thankful that this will be able to continue. At this stage we are seeking sponsorship to have children assessed by a counselling psychologist to undertake a psychometric evaluation to help plan effective service delivery. We currently require 12 assessments to be undertaken! With this assessment it becomes much easier for us to ensure the child obtains the support they truly need!
The grounding we are providing to the children also remains essential. It is worth achknowledging that whilst South Africa may speak of achieving a 75% pass rate at the matric (Grade 12) level only 28% of learners achieved enough to study at degree level! Where we operate in the Eastern Cape the pass rate was also highlighted as the poorest in the country, being at 65%. This shows how we must still continue targeting educational needs when it comes to the children in residential care and helping them to achieve better future prospects.
In recognizing this we have ensured each child at this project as their own individual educational plan. This maps their progress over each term including grade average, subject areas needing attention and also games & resources that can be used where viable. At this stage we had one girl starting high school this year with a grade average of 74% and one of our primary school learners in Grade 6 achieve an average of 70%. We ensure that each child does receive dedicated homework assistance and ensure the educational programme of the project is monitored accordingly. We realize that whilst it is one thing to fundraise it also remains paramount to ensure that results can be achieved through implementation and that is where we aim to also be as transparent as possible.
We are continually grateful for our Global Giving friends and supporters to continue in being champions of this cause! What we keep in our hearts is the knowing that every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. As we continue in our efforts we strive to find the inner magic in all of the children we support. Thank you for being part of the journey!
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