Spacious classroom for Grade R
Zandile Bokwana
AT Walmer Junior Primary School, in Walmer township, 85 Grade R pupils finally have a classroom and furniture after spending the first months of the year crammed into a storeroom at the school.
This comes after school principal Zukiswa Maku applied to the Touch Africa charity organisation for help.
"Four years ago I approached Touch Africa to help build a class for our grade R pupils, but unfortunately they could not help us then, as they were helping other schools," she said.
But subsequently Touch Africa, Dimension Data and Data Flo joined forces to have the grade R classroom built at the school. The construction started last year.
Colins Smith, Dimension Data regional manager IT outsourcing, said their focus was education and health.
"We have helped many schools before, with Walmer High being one of them. We established a science lab and a library at the high school."
He expressed his gratitude to the volunteers who helped to paint the walls of the new grade R classroom.
Grade R teacher Vuyolwethu Sibeko said she was happy now that they have a spacious learning room. Excited Grade R pupil Sinovuyo Tsotsobe, 6, vowed to attend every day.
Parent Bukelwa Sami said she was ecstatic and grateful to everyone who made it possible for the pupils to have a classroom.
The school staff is also faced with other challenges, including not having a staff room to conduct staff meetings, as they had turned the previous staff room into a computer lab for the school.