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Happy Holidays!
 
It is that time of year where we at Edupeg would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your ongoing support in 2016.
Please find, below, our closing dates for 2016 and opening dates for 2017 as well as some recent highlights.
We wish you a very restful holiday season.
This year has seen Edupeg strengthen and solidify our offering in terms of the support we have provided to our schools. We have refined and polished our model and are in the process of seeking SACE accreditation. We realise that in order to ensure the sustainability of our intervention it is crucial that we get all school leaders on board with the support we are providing to their teachers. For many principals much of their time is spent on administrative duties and not on instructional leadership or focusing on the business of teaching and learning. In order to ensure that educational outcomes improve at the schools we support it is crucial that leadership also play a hands-on role in getting teaching right in their classrooms. As much as the teachers in our schools need coaching and support, so do our school leaders. Our focus in 2017 will be on supporting our school leadership teams to ensure that all our schools are well supported to achieve their best results.

Edupeg recently hosted a series of eight very successful leadership workshops across the country with the management teams of all the schools we work in. The main objective of these workshops was to ensure the effectiveness and sustainability of our work in the schools we support for many years to come.

The focus of the workshops was to receive feedback on the support we gave the schools in 2016, to share and collaborate on ideas to support one another in fostering a culture of professional development and to establish what support is required by the school leadership team to ensure the implementation and effectiveness of our support. The workshops also focused around our shared goal of creating excellent teachers and outlined our plans for 2017. We received valuable feedback from all workshops held around the country as well as support from all schools.

Mrs G, our Foundation Phase mentor in KwaZulu-Natal, wrote her first ever blog on her experience of these workshops, which you can read here.

In the fourth and final term of the year our mentors organised a prize-giving at each of their schools. This was to award certificates to their mentored teachers who have been on the Edupeg programme, as well as to award certificates to teachers who participated in all three Teach Like a Champion workshops which we held in the previous terms. They also took this opportunity to do an introductory workshop for next year and to hand out application forms for new mentors for 2017. Mentors reported that the prize-giving’s were very well received as the teachers really felt acknowledge for the hard work and dedication to their profession. Some of our mentors were even surprised by some of the schools they work in when they were presented with certificates of thanks for their support too. At some prize-giving’s neighbouring schools also attended and after hearing more about the Edupeg Project they too were interested in being part of the programme. We once again thank Nashua who sponsored the many certificates that our mentors handed out.
 
Due to the success of the Pencil Project and the overwhelming positing response we received from the schools, it confirmed and highlighted the importance of such basic stationery and how it can contribute to a more positive teaching and learning experience. We therefore wanted to do more, and so we did. Once final amounts were tallied we discovered that, due to the generosity of you, our funders, we had excess funds to supply five of our schools with the same basic stationery. These schools are our most rural of all schools, based in Isandlwana, KwaZulu-Natal and as such they have very little access to such supplies. Needless to say they were over-joyed with the arrival of these basic educational tools.

But, we didn’t stop there! We used this as motivation to supply a further five schools in King Williams Town with the same basic stationery! They are also rural based schools and our mentors based there expressed that their learners were also need of such supplies. 

As we receive more and more positive feedback from our mentors and the schools and see the impact it has on them we have decided to run another campaign for five of our supported schools in KwaNobuhle, Eastern Cape, where our mentors there have also reported the dire need for such basic materials. We ask you to start spreading the word now among your networks so we can gather support for this worthy campaign and keep an eye out on our Facebook page and newsletters for more information once it is up and running. In fact, we have already raised over R8000 from Mike and Mary Gamble in the UK and Justin Naylor - who makes a monthly contribution to Edupeg (which you can too, just ask me how). They are both repeat backers and we thank them and acknowledge them for their contributions towards such a worthy cause and helping us reach our goals.
Our mentors have been inspired by what they have seen in the field and we have three blogs to share with you. The first one is written by Foundation Phase mentor, Lumka Mvunge, on one of her Grade 2 teachers, Ms Mafentile, who says "Thank you Edupeg, today I am a proud teacher because I know I can contribute and make a difference to the development of the young minds of our nation". Read that story here.

Earlier in the year we welcomed two new mentors to our Western Cape team, Phillip Manenge and Linda Matiwane. They have both noticed considerable differences in many of their teachers, you can read about Mr Maginda and Ms Ntabankulu Implementing Techniques, here.

Our Foundation Phase Support Mentor, Ingrid van der Spuy, focused her blog on Why our children aren't learning to read in Grade 1 (and what needs to be done). Read her interesting and detailed blog, with practical tips, here.
We are officially closing on 15 December and re-opening 9 January.
Thank you to everyone for your support in 2016, we look forward to a successful 2017 together. We wish you and your loved ones a safe and festive holiday season.
Mr Schutters trying out his version of STAR with his Grade 5 class. Gelvan Park Primary, Port Elizabeth.
Mr Magele teaching his Grade 4 Natural Science class about input and output energy. Vuyani Primary, Western Cape.
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