Upliftment Through Education

* Educate * Nurture * Enable * Education * Nurture * Enable * Educate * Nurture

Early Childhood Development

We have ECD programmes operating at the Berakah Education Centre in Lusaka Township and at the Viva Village in Alaska Informal Settlement, both in Mamelodi-East, South Africa

Children from 6 months to 6 years receive education in a safe and healthy environment. Breakfast and Lunch are provided and the children are nurtured and cared for by our trained staff. Berakah has a strict Child Protection Policy and visitors and volunteers are likewise required to adhere to our Visitor's Policy, in order to ensure the well-being of the children in our care.

When we are able, we provide children with toys and clothing as well as blankets in the winter.

Outings are organised regularly to the zoo, movies, circus and picnics, where the children are exposed to sights and experiences that they would other wise never have the privilege to, in the informal settlements.

Support of School-Aged Children and Youths

School-aged children arrive at the centre in the afternoons for a warm lunch and help with their home-work. Many of the children in our After Care programme are extremely vulnerable and the meal they receive at Berakah is the only one they get. Homework help is in the form of group-sessions and individual help, with the aid of volunteers and students from the University of Pretoria.

Workshops are given and the children are taught art, drama, music and dance. Berakah has a wonderful Gumboot Dancing Troupe and in this year, we will put together a children's choir, with the help of the University's Music Faculty. We urgently need to have the hall, for workshops and training in the arts.

Support of Vulnerable Families and Home-based OVC, HIV & AIDS Care

Our home-based OVC and HIV/AIDS care touches the communities around our centres in an essential and life-giving way. We have restructured our OVC programme to include the entire family where the orphans and vulnerable children are cared for. We have just over 100 families and as such, our trained community care workers, reach between 800 and 1000 individuals. We provide visits, care, counselling, food and where possible clothing and household goods. Extremely vulnerable families are given residency at the Viva Village, which is the hub of our OVC care programme.

We have launched the Viva Family to Family Virtual Adoption programme whereby a 'virtual' family, consisting of individuals, colleagues, a company, sport club, church group, school class, or privileged family, 'adopts' one of the needy families on our OVC care list. The needs are assessed by us and depending on the size of the family and the prevailing stressors, the care costs between R 600 and R 1200 per month (aprox € 60 - € 100 or US$ 75 - US$ 150). Our care workers provide the service, delivering food parcels, medicine and goods, while we pay school fees and buy school uniforms and stationery as needed. The 'virtual' family get a monthly update.

Adult Basic Education and Training, including Life Skills and facilitating small business initiatives

We provide ABET and Small Business Development Programmes such as a beading programme, finance seminars, chicken hatchery, bread-making, vegetable gardening etc.

In 2009 we provided the US Embassy in Pretoria with 10 000 beaded peace ribbons, creating an income over 6 months for 20 families. Presently about 30 families receive an income through a project to make beaded Vuvuzelas (traditional African horn) for the World Cup Soccer and crocheting motives that is used in the making of exclusive bedlinen.

At the Viva Village we are building our Business Development Centre for Women, for which we are still in need of sponsorship.

* Establishing education centres in underprivileged communities across South Africa.  

It is our vision to duplicate education centres, such as Berakah and OVC support centres such as the Viva Village, all over South-Africa and eventually also in the rest of Africa and other parts of the world.

Please browse around and if you have any questions, mail us at meleney@berakah.org.za!  For updated news, please click here.