Pretoria - Unveiling the many opportunities in the world for learners in township schools is precisely what is needed to unearth the abundance of untapped gems that lie in wait.
This was according to Reneilwe Mathebula a teacher from Jaftha Mahlangu Secondary School who brought a handful of their school's top performers to the South African National Roads Agency's (Sanral) scholarships and bursaries activation programme.
The programme launched at the Eersterust Civic Centre yesterday invited numerous schools from around Eersterust and Mamelodi to share the available opportunities through their bursaries and scholarships programme for learners to apply for.
The scholarships are available to high school learners from Grade 8 to Grade 12 regardless of their subject choice.
This as the Sanral financial support for education indicated that it was looking beyond the traditional scope of engineering.
The bursary programme which formerly focused purely on funding engineering studies is now within the reach of students pursuing an array of tertiary qualifications at public universities across the country.
This includes supporting students looking to study Supply Chain and Procurement Management, Human Resources and even Environmental Science.
Mathebula said the school and learners welcomed the programme and changes as even though they had learners who did their best academically, due to the poor backgrounds they came from, many did not know what life after Grade 12 held in store for them.
"Bringing opportunities to learners is something big because not every family has what it takes to expose their child to what's out there for them. So having organisations like Sanral do this for our learners is a crucial eye-opener."
"Many of our learners have no plans for when they finish school because you can plan but when there is no one at home who has the financial resources to help realise those plans, it ends up being quite disheartening."
Dr Constance Dhlamini, the HOD in the Life Orientation department at J. Kekana Secondary School, said the learners from their school desperately needed to hear about the opportunities available to them and have people from crucial organisations to encourage them to focus more on their studies.
"I mean now they know that at the very least they can strive to get 70% which isn't that difficult to obtain so that they are able to access these opportunities, they did not think they could reach before."
"For learners hearing that there is money for registration, textbooks, accommodation, transport and living expenses was something very exciting for them because that was their biggest hurdle. What better motivation could there be than for them to know that all they need to do is focus and work hard on their studies and the rest could be handled by obtaining these funds."
According to Sanral whereas previously learners were required to get a 70% aggregate overall to be eligible for consideration, they would now require 60% with a view to improving their aggregate to 70%.
This information was a relief for Grade 9 learner Ali Surprise Maluleka from J. Kekana Secondary School, who said he always thought bursaries and scholarships were reserved for those getting 80% and higher.
"Hearing that all I had to do was to obtain 70% in my final year was encouraging to me as I have been pushing to keep my marks above the 80% mark. I'm happy they brought this information to us because most of us simply lack that information of what to do to take our studies further."
"I initially thought of studying law but listening to these speakers made me realise that I should rather look towards going for scarce skills unlike going for a course where the market is already heavily saturated and low on employment."
Pretoria News