Caring citizens have committed to securing the future of others by establishing a fund for their education.
This is after realising the effects poor education could have had in citizens’ lives if they had not been assisted by others. Also, after revelations by local tertiary institutions that thousands of children drop out of tertiary education annually due to financial reasons. This drop out leaves them with shattered dreams and propensity to crime for survival. The citizens’ initiative comes at a time when the nation is also struggling with close to 30 percent youth employment and other social ills like teenage pregnancies, drug and substance abuse and endemic trans-generational poverty.
The organisation, Lets Build Our Country Together Fund, started this year reaffirming its commitment at the Altrec Sports Complex, when they exposed their bursary scheme to poor students.
Penny Mpanza, fund’s founder chief executive officer said the bleakness of the future for poor youths touched her and others in the co-operate world to start the fund. “They have no prospect for worthy lives especially when the education authorities glorify 30 percent mark as a pass in matric. This perpetuates a culture of illiteracy and subsequent poverty twenty years into democracy, when we should be celebrating positive change and improved livelihoods through quality education,” she said.
Mpanza added that education is central to any meaningful and sustainable change, but was denied to many children in townships and rural areas. “Despite their natural capability to excel, they instead, fell through the cracks and did not fit into the main stream economy and remained unemployed.” She said there was a need to build the country together with them by changing society’s mentality to one of Ubuntu, that of giving back to the less fortunate in qualitative ways.
The fund is offering 250 bursaries and facilitates access to other services like tutoring and mentoring. The bursaries are holistic packages of full tertiary tuition fees, books, food and accommodation. Eligibility is 60 percent matric pass, tertiary studies in the health and human sciences, and also other career interests like music and design. Mpanza said beneficiaries will also be assisted with internships and advice on employment opportunities. In the true sense of Ubuntu, the beneficiaries will be expected to contribute financially to the fund when employed to sustain its support to others. Also, Mpanza indicated that some colleges have committed to reduced costs for intakes enrolled in groups.
Details: LBOCFund; 010 003 7474.
