Our Focus

Currently, EwB's efforts are focused on Fezeka Senior Secondary, its middle school, Songeze, and the surrounding township of Gugulethu (population: 400,000), just outside of Cape Town, South Africa.

Our overall mandate is to work in different parts of the world but, as a relatively small charity with limited resources, we believe that at this stage of our life cycle a singular focus will produce quantifiable results. It allows us to really know the community, to work profoundly and deeply with problems on site, and to use this experience, as we expand, to serve additional communities in South Africa.

The problems at the schools are significant:

- Located in an impoverished overcrowded shanty town, crime and violence are rife.

- The combined total of 1,440 students means classes are hopelessly overcrowded with approximately 40 children per classroom.

- A significantly high drop-out rate between Grades 11 (445 students) and 12 (100 students) means many students do not complete their schooling. Reasons for dropping out include their need to earn a living and support their families.

- To compound matters, there is a lack of jobs (60% unemployment) and so many formerly good students are forced to turn to drugs and/or crime.

- 44 teachers share a tiny staff room.

- Not only are black schools like Fezeka and Songeze struggling with inadequate facilities and social problems, they exist in an education system that for years excluded them. During the apartheid era, very few blacks had the opportunity to graduate from high school. Some of the teachers in township schools like Fezeka and Songeze are still suffering from the effects of this discrimination.

EwB is currently midway through a 5-year plan to move Fezeka Senior Secondary to a higher level of academic achievement. Initially, our efforts were in response to basic needs (classrooms were built) and to feedback from visioning sessions (dance and photography were among our first projects).

However, it became increasingly evident that to change the academic outcomes we needed to address several root issues such as basic Mathematics and English literacy and teacher and administrative support.

Recent initiatives have reflected that: volunteer teachers, tutors and project managers; after-school lessons; professional development; career counselling.

The great challenge ahead is to address, in whatever way we can, the underlying socio-economic barriers to success. A simple example is the vast number of students who attend school hungry each day, which affects their ability to learn.