Saturday 20 April marked Nyanga’s first official parents’ meeting for 2013. The meeting started a little later than anticipated, as we waited for the parents to arrive, but soon, many of them did, and the meeting started in earnest.
Shuvai, the branch co-ordinator welcomed the parents and introduced the staff and tutors who were present, then handed over to Siphelele, the branch assistant, who then ran the meeting. Siphelele introduced the parents to IY and explained the tutoring program, since the majority of Nyanga’s learners this year are first time ikamvanites whose parents had not yet had a chance to learn about IY from staff members.
Key issues raised in the meeting include learners missing tutoring on account of bad weather, parents’ concerns about gangsterism and violence as impediments to learners attending and a plea to parents to collaborate with branch staff in monitoring attendance, communication and report collection.
Xola Booi, an ex-learner turned tutor, also got a chance to tell the parents about her experience at IkamvaYouth since 2010 when she joined the branch as a grade 10 learner, and received applause from the parents for sharing so clearly and expanding on issues parents were unclear on.
The morning ended on a high note, with staff meeting individual parents to discuss learners and other concerns, over light eats.
A successful parents’ meeting indeed!
On the 13th of April, Nyanga Matrics got an opportunity to attend the annual UCT Open Day.
This was an important excursion for the Grade 12s as they got to visit a highly regarded institution in their province and learn more about the different programs they can study, and the funding opportunities available to them for tertiary studies.
The learners had a good time, not only attending information sessions but observing experiments and other demonstrations, and also having fun around campus, as those who will soon be walking university campus grounds in less than a year.
Nkosinathi Kaziwa, a grade 12 had the following to say about the day:
I learnt more about the career that I want to pursue, and also learnt about new careers such as Audiology and Environmental and Geographical Science.’
We are excited to have our learners exposed to other career paths and options and know that this Open Day is the first of many eye-opening and informative Career Guidance sessions our learners will be exposed to throughout the year.
This week IkamvaYouth, Equal Education and the South African Education and Environment Project (SAEP) will host the annual Careers Indaba.
Businesses, NGOs, professionals, tertiary institutions and Further Education and Training colleges will run information stalls to grade 8-12 students from Khayelitsha, Nyanga, Makhaza, Strand, Kraaifontein, Masiphumelele and surrounding areas.
DATE: Friday, 19 April 2013
TIME: 13h00-17h00
VENUE: Zolani Centre, Sithandatu Avenue, Nyanga, 7750
ENTRY: free
Come wearing your school uniform!
Many learners face challenges when considering their tertiary studies. These challenges include insufficient access to information regarding academic and occupational options as well as affording the cost of further studies.
The Career Indaba provides assistance to learners making decisions about their future. Exhibitors will expose learners to a variety of careers paths and options. Learners will also have the opportunity to learn about scholarships and bursary programs that are available to them.
The programme will include workshops on CV writing, interviewing skills, personal development and study techniques.
For more information:
Marion Petersen
marion@ikamvayouth.org
m: 0798854388
t: 0214224306
Kate Wilkinson
kate@equaleducation.org.za
t: 0213870022
e: 0716824515
Lydia Wasilenko
lydia.eva@live.com
t: 0213870022
So we wanted to do to these cooking classes with the Ikamva Youth students in Nyanga. We had a few things to contemplate before we got started.
Our background as students from Copenhagen is in global nutrition and health. The question we posed ourselves was: How do you teach about health and nutrition when you come from different cultures and different realities?
Health, what is considered healthy and what the health needs of different people are, is certainly determined by different contexts. In other words, we knew that we couldn’t waltz into Nyanga and tell students how to change their diets and dictate to them what ‘healthy’ is, since the term is so variable and there are other determinants such as household income which affect what people can afford to eat.
We therefore saw the cooking classes as an opportunity to explore and expose students to different cultures through food. In doing so we hoped to inspire students to broaden their awareness of food culture and ideas around health, simultaneously daring them to stay open minded and try things that seemed foreign to them.
In South Africa different types of foods and meals are associated with different groups of people. White people eat this, Black people eat that, Coloured people eat this and that, Indian people this and so on. By exposing students to different foods and cultural ideas we hoped to invite them to cross these cultural stereotypes and boundaries.
Many ideas. Is our line of thinking relevant? Should one expose students to foods and ingredients that they can’t buy in their immediate environment or can’t even afford?
We think ‘YES’. Exposure to the unfamiliar can assist us in becoming critical thinkers and developing empathy towards other cultures. Most importantly it also allows us to rethink and be critical of cultural stereotypes and fixed definitions of things. Overly idealistic? Perhaps 🙂
OK so we had an idea and an intention but how were we going to fund this baby? Jesper came up with the brilliant plan to do a fundraising charity event. A Yoga and Lunch charity event in Arderne Gardens, Claremont to be precise. After much planning and spreading the word, we pulled off the event together with the 16 Nyanga students.
The event took place on 17 March 2013 and we were overwhelmed by the support we received! Since we were teaching a yoga class, on the menu for the day was Indian food. We used ingredients such as asafetida (a spice) and ghee (clarified butter), which is at the heart of Indian cooking, in all the dishes me made. The food we prepared was inspired by an Indian woman, Sandhya, who has been making food for Western yoga students for many years in the south of India in Mysore, Karnataka.
The food was delicious and all the participants wanted the recipes and another homemade chapati to take home. The chapati ‘team‘ kicked butt and made those chapattis like pros – you guys rocked!
IMMENSE GRATITUDE
In the end we raised R6000 to put towards our cooking classes and we are simply delighted and blown away by the support that we have received.
A huge thank you to all the amazing people who supported our Yoga & Lunch fundraising event! Thank you to IkamvaYouth for the opportunity to work with the students, and thank you to the incredible students.
Thank you all a thousand times over :))
Jesper and Sharline
We wanted to do to these cooking classes with the Ikamva Youth students in Nyanga and found that we had a few things to contemplate before we got started.
Our background as students from Copenhagen is in global nutrition and health. The question we posed ourselves was: How do you teach about health and nutrition when you come from different cultures and different realities?
Health, what is considered healthy and what the health needs of different people are, is certainly determined by different contexts. We knew that we could not waltz into Nyanga and tell students how to change their diets and dictate to them what ‘healthy’ is, since the term varies according toa number of determinants such as household income, which affect what people can afford to eat.
We therefore saw the cooking classes as an opportunity to explore and expose students to different cultures through food. In doing so we hoped to inspire students to broaden their awareness of food culture and ideas around health, while simultaneously encouraging them to stay open minded and try cuisines that seemed foreign to them.
In South Africa different types of foods and meals are associated with different groups of people, and certain foods are often considered the diets of some cultures and not others. By exposing students to different foods and cultural ideas we hoped to invite them to cross these cultural stereotypes and boundaries.
We had to work through many ideas at this stage, posing questions such as: Is our line of thinking relevant? Should we expose students to foods and ingredients that they can not buy in their immediate environment and ingredients that they can not afford?
Finally, we decided that it was worthwhile. Exposure to the unfamiliar can assist us in becoming critical thinkers and developing empathy towards other cultures. Most importantly it also allows us to rethink and be critical of cultural stereotypes and fixed definitions of things.
The next big question on our figurative plates was how we were going to fund this exercise. Jesper came up with the brilliant plan to do a fundraising charity event. A Yoga and Lunch charity event in Arderne Gardens, Claremont to be precise. After much planning and spreading the word, we were all set to host the event with the 16 Nyanga students.
The event took place on 17 March 2013 and we were overwhelmed by the support we received! Since we were teaching a yoga class, on the menu for the day was Indian food. We used ingredients such as asafetida (a spice) and ghee (clarified butter), which is at the heart of Indian cooking, in all the dishes me made. The food we prepared was inspired by an Indian woman, Sandhya, who has been making food for Western yoga students for many years in the south of India in Mysore, Karnataka.
The food was delicious and all the participants wanted the recipes and another homemade chapati to take home. The chapati ‘team‘ outdid themselves everyone asked for a second helping of chapati.
IMMENSE GRATITUDE
In the end we raised R6000 to put towards our cooking classes and we are overly delighted and blown away by the support that we have received.
A huge thank you to all the amazing people who supported our Yoga & Lunch fundraising event! Thank you to IkamvaYouth for the opportunity to work with the students, and thank you to the incredible students.
Thank you all a thousand times over :))
Jesper and Sharline
This last weekend Nyanganites got together for a highly successful Strategic Planning Weekend, SPW. Learners, volunteers and staff put their heads together and mapped out the year plan for 2013.
Nyanga learners showed that they are youngsters with a vision for their branch and are more than capable of taking their future into their own hands. Together, they outlined the challenges they currently face at the branch, and then came up with solutions to those challenges. The volunteers also brought their best to the session, guiding the learners and assisting them in expressing themselves and working on the different issues that came up during the weekend.
On the last day of the SPW, Nyanganites elected their 2013 branch committee, with some Nyanganites self-nominating and motivating why they wanted to be part of certain portfolios. It was highly gratifying to see the learners and volunteers confidently speaking out and outlining their own strong points.
Find the full report on the following link: spw_report_2013.pdf
Lloyd Lungu