Dear Friends of The Kusasa Project
We wish you all a happy and prosperous to 2012. This year starts in full swing as we open the doors of our Early Learning Centre on January 18th to twenty Xhosa and twenty Coloured children.
At Franschhoek High School the number of children on Bursaries and supported by The Kusasa Project, jumps significantly to almost 40 and we aim to push and encourage them to even greater success.
All of our other programs continue and our intention is to ratchet up the levels of literacy throughout the schools in the valley, as well as implementing the array of after school clubs.
This year will also see us surpass the 500,000 mark in the number of breakfasts provided since 2007.
Our work is only achieved because of the network of volunteers and donors from all over the globe and we offer huge and sincere thanks for the wonderful generous spirit within each and every one of you.
Very best wishes
Doug, Dave, Jacquie, Sally, Sintu and The Kusasa Project Team
The Kusasa Project Early
Learning Centre - We need your help!
After 5 year working with poor children in South
Africa we are establishing an Early Learning
Centre for pre-school & early primary school
kids to address the debilitating problem of
illiteracy & innumeracy afflicting the kids we
serve. By intervening with professional
education at an early age, our volunteers &
staff working in the schools can give kids a
chance to learn.
The Kusasa Project will
provide the head-start these kids deserve.
The hard facts for poor rural
schools in South Africa:
- South Africa has a short-fall of 30,000
teachers
- > 1 million children do not have
teachers
- Literacy & numeracy levels grow worse
from grades 3-6-9
- Student : teacher ratio = 63:1
- Lack of time teaching 3.5 hours/day
- Uneducated & ineffective teachers
- Misuse/non-use of re-sources
- Children pass through school with little
or no literacy & numeracy skills
We Need Your Help to
bring structured literacy & numeracy to children
aged 4-6. R275 000 / £25,000 will support an
Early Learning Centre staffed by trained,
motivated teachers/assistants, using
educationally sound materials in an stimulating
environment.
FUNDING REQUEST: £ 25
000 / R 275 000
Use of funds: Teacher salary & materials
Target Opening: Jan 2012 Targeted Intake: Xhosa
& Afrikaans children
Venue: Community Centre space; new facility
under discussion w/Intl. donor
Funding Targets: Individual/Corp/Schools
Ongoing Funding: Donors, Civic Organizations,
Student contribution (small) and Education
Department grant
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Memorials and
Celebrations
Last week we said farewell to
Ntsikelelo Jobela who
died suddenly on Wednesday morning - we all
greatly mourn his loss and miss his ready smile
and warm and charming disposition - he tread
gently on this earth.
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Reading in small groups at Wemmershoek - at the
end of the second testing session - groups are
flourishing and children enjoying the attention
and the feeling of achievement they feel in the
smaller groups.
En route - the little 'urchins' who help every
afternoon in the library and wait until the very
last moment to get a ride down the hill from Dalubuhle school in the back of Uncle Dave's
bakkie. They have taken to playing
'school-school' and 'teach-teach' in the
afternoons and emulate their own lessons in
small groups using the new Oxford reading tree
books - they are very amusing and take one back
to ones own childhood where one used to beat the
goodness out of ones 'dolls!!!' lots of talk and
strong sounding explanations, lots of writing
and white board work and endless reprimands and
repetition! |
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A kaleidoscope
of Kusasa activities
Acapella at La Petite Ferme where our children
did us proud with their beautiful voices; supper
club where Robyn spoke about a future in Nature
Conservation and where Sibuthe, Sbulelo and
Sisipho entertained us with their well prepared
speeches; Golf day with Doug in excellent form
at the Elephant and Barrel in Franschhoek;
pupils at wes-Eind spend their recreation like
all boys - kicking around a ball; before and
after of the libraries - they are now in full
swing and are not only the repository of books
but are also the venues for our small reading
groups; Franschhoek champagne festival where we
once again encouraged wine and champagne
aficionados to part with their hard earned cash
to take a ticket to win 32 bottles of the best
cap classique in the country for the children of
the Kusasa project!
Skype to America where Julie Mitchell and her
pupils in Montana staged a show for over 2000
people whose central theme was South Africa and
more specifically the children of the Kusasa
Project reflecting their hopes and dreams
through their conversations and poetry. And
finally the thespians who put on a show of all
the poems written by young people for the
Franschhoek literary festival - a fantastic
evening. |
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Sharlto Copley visits The Kusasa Project
Yesterday we were privileged to have Sharlto
Copley (allias Wikus van der Merwe in District 9
and Murdock in the A-Team) who came especially
to Franschhoek to visit Madame Spiers (his High
School French Teacher and life long friend) and
see where she was now working. He visited all
the primary schools in which The Kusasa Project
is involved and then gave two awe inspiring
talks to the senior grades in Bridge House and
Franschhoek High respectively.
He had the young
people and aspiring celebrities of the future
eating out of his hand when he described his
journey to the top of his profession: - how he
has had many doors slammed in his face and had
experienced much heart ache and failure.
He also mentioned the flip side of the celebrity
culture where even the most seasoned actors feel
a constant sense of insecurity - the only true
exception of the actors he has spent time with
is Dustin Hoffman.
Sharlto accentuated the importance for young
people to follow their dreams and believe in
themselves whilst having a real perception of
thier inherent capabilities. Certainly our
Chello children were deeply touched by his visit
and little Jordy Gurr our co-founders son
delighted in shadowing Sharlto the whole day and
learning as much as he could about the
profession he is destined to follow. The whole
day was magic!
Thank you Sharlto for making the time to
be with us and we hope that you will come again
in the not too distant future! |
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Bridge House
and The Kusasa Project work together!
The Bridge House girls and boys of the ROUND
SQUARE club have offered to come up to Dalubuhle
twice a week in order to read to the Grade 3
pupils in the library and in this way help with
the literacy program that has already been
launched. In order to help the reader to achieve
both competence and confidence when reading and
to further their understanding of what they are
reading they will use the Kagiso - literacy for
all books which forms the core vehicle for
literacy acquisition in the Primary schools
which The Kusasa Projects serves. Thank you to
these wonderful young people who give so
generously of their time.
Updated 24 January 2011
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| Intensive
Literacy Programme Lunched! |
"2011 promises to be a very
exciting year for The Kusasa Project. We are
launching a more intensive literacy programme by
using the volunteers to take much smaller groups
of the most able students and to teach them how
to read using the 'literacy for all' system.
This program depends not only on the generosity
of the volunteers and the collaboration of the
teachers, who will work alongside the
volunteers, but also on the full functionality
of the school libraries in these schools.
This has necessitated the conversion of storage
rooms into libraries and each of these converted
or reclaimed rooms will need a full
refurbishment as well as continuous stocking
with childrens books and readers. We are moving
forward with a vengeance on all fronts!" JBS
Updated: 11 January 201
How can you help?
The Kusasa Literacy Programme is in desperate
need of books, so readers if you can help please
contact us. This is a constant "work in
progress" as there are ongoing needs or
accessing, cover and repairing of the books due
to the very poor state from previous overuse! |
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