Focus on sports

"OUR relationship is not based on material acquisition but rather on improving sports in the school.”

This is what Lungisa High School principal Skhumbuzo Nofemele said of their twinning programme with Wilson Stuart School and Sports College, from Birmingham in the UK, which started in 2006.

The school is for the physically impaired. Situated in KwaDwesi, Lungisa High is one of the three schools in the province which were selected by the Eastern Cape Sports, Recreation and Culture Department as part of its schools sports mass participation programme last year.

The programme was linked to the British Council’s Dreams and Teams project, which helps develop young leaders through using sports and culture as vehicles to bridge the gap between racial groups.

Grade 12 pupils Sinesipho Maqubela and Achuma Klaas spent a week in the UK in March last year for training in leadership and the organisation of sports festivals.

Nofemele said they were doing more like the same curriculum with Wilson Stuart School, which put a strong emphasis on sports. "They (at Wilson Stuart High) feel that sports is a vital instrument in valuing each other.”

He said their relationship with the school was that of "using sports as a vehicle in moulding all aspects of our learners’ lives”. "We are also looking at cultivating values through using sports,” said Nofemele.

The two schools visited each other on an annual basis, "but this year we couldn’t visit (each other) because of this global recession”.

They continued communicating with each other, however, through e-mails.

Nofemele said the partnership with Wilson Stuart School propelled pupils who were already in "motion” regarding their sporting codes to do more; while cultivating interest in other pupils.