BIRTHDAYS – Gertrude celebrated her 18th birthday on 11th of March, Phillip turned 5 on 12th and Morgan also turned 5 on 26th of March, 2021. The children are always delighted to celebrate their birthdays, especially the younger ones.
SCHOOLS – All children are in school including those that qualified to grades 8 and 10. Gertrude is currently volunteering as an assistant teacher at Kwathu Free Haven School to help her improve her skill set of working with children and get an idea of being in this profession as she awaits going to college.
VISITATIONS – A mother’s love must be given unconditionally to establish trust and a firm foundation of emotional bond in a child’s life. As such, the parents and relatives of the children are encouraged to keep the bond with the children here at Kwathu, as this makes it easy during reintegration when children have reached 18 years old. Unfortunately, that is not the case for most of the children, because relatives visit some children while others have not and their whereabouts are unknown. In order to visit the child, the parents or relatives have to get an authorization letter from the Department of Social Welfare and present to Kwathu Ministries. This month we had two mothers that came to visit their children and have been consistent in their visitations. We had Alex and Ruth’s mother, the mother is deaf and dumb. She is also Edward and Morgan’s aunt. It was not easy for the children to welcome their mother in the first few months they were brought to Kwathu, but the situation has improved and the children seem more free and happy to see their mother. Theresa and Philip’s mother also visited to wish her beloved son Philip a happy belated birthday. The siblings were happy to see their mother and spend time with her. She also brought birthday gifts for Philip.
KWATHU SCHOOL REPORT – Kwathu Free Haven School had a variety of activities in the month of March. Besides the global outbreak of the corona virus, the school has had normal lessons as planned by the school administration. Class time and the duration of lessons is now back to normal. Additionally, the school has been conducting School Based Assessments to the grades 5, 6 and 7 classes. These assessments are calculated annually and each year a student is graded out of ten percent 10%, by the end of three years a total of 30% is added to the final grade seven (7) examination.
FEEDING PROGRAM – Our feeding program initiative has continued in the month of March. This has been an interesting program for both the teachers and the pupils. To the students, the initiative has helped them learn with an open mind where they get to have more interest in coming to school because they know that they will have a meal whilst at school. On the other hand, teachers have found it easy to teach the pupils well because there is much concentration to the learners in class.
On the 8th of March, Kwathu women, like any other women in the world celebrated International Woman’s Day. Four days after that, on the 12th of March we celebrated Youth Day with all the students at the school.
CHICKEN PROJECT – It has been our dream to start an initiative that can be bringing in some income at the local level. After brain storming it was agreed that we put up a small structure that can be used to rare about 200 chickens. We are glad to report that in the month of March we managed to construct a structure up to roof level. It is our hope that this building should be done by April and that we bring in the chicks for us to begin this long awaited project.
OUR NEED LIST:
- School Bus (US$20,000)
- School Supplies (Pencils, crayons, sharpeners, calculators, pens, etc.
- Clothing for ages 6 – 20
- Air conditioning units for Kwathu offices
KWATHU FARM NEEDS
- Tractor
- Plough
- Second hand utility vehicle
To give a donation towards Kwathu Ministries, please follow this link: kwathuhome.com
Contact us at kwathuoffice@gmail.com, we would love to hear from you!
