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During the South African Winter season in June and July, SHAWCO volunteers retreats to their various homes for a much deserved vacation of their own after examinations and the first half of the year’s SHAWCO Education Projects. Likewise, the schools of the Cape Metropolitan area shuts down, leaving most of the kids of our communities vulnerable to gangsterism and substance abuse as they have no other place to go to but to turn to the streets. SHAWCO’s Holiday project ran it’s first ever program in 2007 hosting ten selfless students from Arcadia University in USA. These students gave up six weeks of their Summer vacation in the USA, to fill a much needed role in the communities in our communities. This tailor made program was designed to fit both the needs of the students and the community members. The first two weeks of this experience are spent providing young adults between the ages of 18 and 35 years old with basic IT knowledge while experiencing the realities of the issues these communities face on a day to day basis through dialogue with their learners. To the Adult learners, these IT classes provided to them are a ray of light, a beacon of hope to find employment to support themselves and their families. Some of these people have never seen let alone worked on computers and their level of computer knowledge varies.
The following two weeks are spent tutoring and mentoring young learners from grades 6 to 9 on subjects like Mathematics, English, debating and life skills. These learners are recruited from our regular SHAWCO projects which they attend during the year and are taken on academic excursions to places like museums as well as excursions to the seaside. To you and I this may seem like such insignificant ventures, but most of these kids have never seen life outside of their little shack in their township. Our visiting students’ plays such a big role in these kids’ lives and it is so important to them to know that there are people out there who care. More often than not, a tear or two is shed when it gets to the end of the program and visiting student participants and learners, both adult and child, have to part ways and say their goodbyes. Coupled with the Adult IT Training and Service Learning program, these students attends a host of lectures provided by SHAWCO around subjects like Service Learning, Civil Society, Adult Education, Social Politics and many more. Last but not least, what good would be to travel half way across the world and not experience local culture. A series of excursions are built into the program to visit many of the national sites such as Robben Island – the island on which former President Nelson Mandela spent most of his 27 years of incarceration before becoming South Africa’s first democratically elected President. A staff member and driver are dedicated to the group for the duration of programme to ensure that students are enjoying a safe and friendly environment at all times
We can proudly report that these communities not only gains and develops from this project, but also forms lifelong bonds and friendships with the students. If you were a part of the SHAWCO Holiday Project in the past, please forward your testimonial (and pics) and share your experience with students who are interested. |
