Here is a summary of Education Africa’s impact and achievements for 2019:
• We have hosted 3 Education Africa Executive Experiences, “A Day in the Life of a Prisoner” overnight on Robben Island.
• We have partnered once again with the Johannesburg Genocide & Holocaust Centre and UNIC and hosted a schools’ workshop about the Holocaust and the Rwanda genocide for 151 disadvantaged learners.
• Our Sounds of Celebration VI Concert featured 180 young South African performers and we sponsored 2 000 disadvantaged learners to attend the matinee performance.
• 2 000 competing musicians participated in our annual Education Africa International Marimba & Steelpan Festival and we sponsored 500 disadvantaged learners to enable them to come from far and wide to participate.
• We facilitated a R3-million donation towards Masibambane College in Orange Farm, the school we founded in 1997 and continue to support. We are proud of the school’s 2019 Matric class which achieved a 100% pass rate, with 69.81% of the school’s matrics qualifying for bachelors passes. 56 distinction were achieved in total.
• Through our Early Childhood Development (ECD) project, 17 caregivers from Soweto graduated with their SAQA NQF 4 certification as Early Childhood Development practitioners, having successfully completed our ECD Train the Trainer programme.
• Our new ECD certified practitioners are impacting thousands of young learners from our ECD training project, ensuring their school readiness as they progress into the formal schooling sector
• Our new intake of 20 caregivers for our ECD Train the Trainer programme started their 18-month programme in February.
• Yet another Award for our CEO and Founder, James Urdang! Having received the international Klaus J Jacobs Award for social innovation and change-making in the field of child and youth development in November 2018, James went on to be recognised at the 2019 Gauteng Premier’s Service Excellence Awards with a bronze award in the Leadership category.
• Joan Lithgow and the Education Africa music team were recognised with a Silver Award in the category: Arts & Culture at the 2019 Gauteng Premier’s Service Excellence Awards.
• Our Marimba Hubs are providing after school marimba training for 900 learners each week.
• We have hosted 3 Marimba workshops for educators.
• We have hosted 8 workshops for ECD caregivers as part of our ongoing commitment to our ECD project.
• We have awarded 18 bursaries to disadvantaged students and learners through our Walter Sisulu Scholarship Fund.
• 15 students have been sponsored to participate in our UNISA 1-year certification course: Programme in Business Focused Management.
• We continue to seek funding for our SAMUN project, which has been on hold due to a lack of funding for the past two years.
