Project News  

Sibongile Project Successes

On March 23, the three shipping containers that once housed 24 children and the offices of Sibongile were rebuilt into a gorgeous day care center that is fully equipped with a new kitchen, conference room, office, bathrooms, and open plan daycare and physiotherapy space.  The grand opening was the result of much time and effort from the community, the Sibongile staff, and our Tremendous Hearts volunteers Johan de Besche, Sara Stackhouse, and their children, Zachary and Violet.

The additional space has already made it possible to introduce walkers, standers, and other critical physical therapy equipment to the Sibongile program, increasing the options for improving the lives of the disabled children there.

More great news was recently delivered to our friends at Sibongile after the Tremendous Hearts team introduced the organization to Helen Zille, the Premier of the Western Cape Province.  Impressed with Sibongile's model of care and successes, Premier Zille went to bat for the organization. She prompted the City of Cape Town to donate the land that the Sibongile Day Care Centre currently sits on to the organization and ensured that Sibongile would receive its first-ever government funding.

With the de Besche family departure planned for late June, we are working hard to set up an effective and seamless transition to our new volunteer, Becky Molinini, a physical therapist who arrives in early June for a year.

The Sibongile community in Khayelitsha is so grateful for the de Besche-Stackhouse family's commitment to its most vulnerable children, who are, as a result, receiving everything from the all-important improved physical therapy to a smile-filled day of makeovers by young Violet.  While the de Besche-Stackhouse family will not be replaced in our hearts, the work that they started will be carried on by Becky with equal passion.

Kathleen Callahan arrived in March from Minnesota after a career in investment management and state government.  A tri-athlete and rated golfer, she is enjoying passing on her love for these hobbies to children living in foster care.  Kathleen started a running group for the six teenagers in Khayelitsha and is supporting their exploration of bicycling at a program called Velokhaya.  Since sports are not offered in Cape Town schools, Kathleen is partnering with a local South African youth mentor, who will continue to encourage and facilitate the children's participation in athletics after Kathleen leaves.  She has also started an exercise class for the seven foster mothers in Khayelitsha and reached out to several teenagers at Abaphumeleli Place of Safety to connect them with Velokhaya.

Masazane Soup Kitchen Opening in April 

The Masazane Soup Kitchen is expected to be up and running by the end of April 2012! 

This project was initiated by Tremendous Hearts' founder and volunteer professional, Marilyn Votaw and the Rondebosch United Church (RUC) community in response to a request for a sustainable food supply for the goGogetters, a wonderful group of grandmothers providing support for more than 145 children in the Mbekweni township near Paarl. The funding for the appliances and equipment has been generously supplied by a large group of organizations and individuals that includes the RUC community, a German NGO, individuals in Denver, Colorado, and a group from First Congregational Church of Berkeley in California.

The team has been working diligently to engage other stakeholders in the project to ensure its sustainability. They opened a dialogue with the head of the Department of Social Development for the Drakenstein Municipality to ensure that the local government is providing support. The team has also connected the goGos with the Catholic Welfare and Development (CWD) feeding scheme in Mbekweni. CWD has provided the goGos with plots, tools, and seeds to grow their own fresh vegetables, which will add to their ability to feed the children on an ongoing basis.

This grand opening would not have come so quickly if it had not been for these donors and the tremendous efforts of the joint Tremendous Hearts/RUC team.

Volunteer "Sneak Peeks" 

Many of our long-term volunteers come to Tremendous Hearts as part of a journey that includes anything from pursuing a career path (like physical therapy or social work) to looking for a more meaningful retirement to realizing that serving others enriches their lives.  This journey often begins with a brief visit to Cape Town.  At Tremendous Hearts, we believe that our volunteers should make an educated decision about committing six months or more of their lives to our mission.  We always welcome potential volunteers who want a sneak peek - to meet the children we serve and the adults who care for them and to see what living in South Africa is really like.  We also hope they will return, as many do, ready to commit even more time to the children we serve.

In April, Nicole Salamy, a speech and language pathologist in Boston, visited to explore the ways in which her professional skills and experience might be useful at Sibongile and other Tremendous Hearts' partner organizations.

Nicole has a B.A. from Villanova University and a M.S. from Boston University in Speech-Language Pathology.  She has worked at The Learning Center for the Deaf (TLC) in Massachusetts for ten years where she provides speech, language, and communication services to children who have hearing loss and other communication disorders.  Currently, Nicole also supervises the clinical team at TLC, which includes speech, physical, and occupational therapists.  She has provided home-based therapy to numerous children including those who have autism.

Nicole and Tremendous Hearts' volunteer, Johan de Besche, worked together on an interdisciplinary team providing therapies to children in Massachusetts for nine years.  While visiting South Africa, Nicole worked with Johan and his growing team at Sibongile to assess the speech, language, and communication needs of the children there. Nicole brought with her four augmentative communication devices, donated by two different organizations, that help facilitate communication for people who struggle to use spoken language.  With a little experimentation, Nicole was able to quickly customize the devices so they used culturally-appropriate images and asked several Xhosa-speaking caregivers to record the words "spoken" by the devices. Having access to this device was life-changing for one child Sibongile who was able to tell her caregivers, for the first time, that  she was cold and wanted a pair of socks put on her feet!

Nicole also delivered some simple training to the Sibongile caregivers in language-based developmental play. She was pleased to see that, not only are some of the children ready and able to grow using these techniques, but their caregivers were excited to learn new ways to help their children progress.

"It was fun to work with Johan and be able to bring some of our 

experiences to the team at Sibongile and  to brainstorm ideas 

about how to move forward together."   ~ Nicole Salamy

In May, Joye Dickens, who has visited us in Cape Town before, is returning for several months to explore the possibility of committing for a full year.  During her sneak peek visit, she will jump into multiple ongoing projects.  She will help the Sibongile team complete a medical records project to ensure that Sibongile complies with the Western Cape Department of Health's recordkeeping requirements.  She will also give a workshop to the Home from Home foster mothers on listening skills that can be used with their children, especially as they approach adolescence.

At the same time, our staff will work with Joye to develop a trauma counseling project that effectively leverages her 25 years of experience in family systems therapy and grief counseling.  That way, when she returns for a longer stay, the Cape Town community will receive the greatest possible benefit from her professional skills and limitless energy.

"I'm ready to jump in and help wherever I might be needed.
I am excited about using my professional experience to make a significant difference at Sibongile and Home from Home." ~ Joye Dickens

Tremendous Hearts is developing relationships with several new organizations, including Nonceba Family Counselling Centre, Etafeni, Umtha Welenga, and Abaphumeleli Place of Safety.  To assist these local community efforts, we're looking for candidates with experience in: 

• General office management
• Volunteer recruitment and management
• Fundraising and events 
• Psychological and trauma counseling
• Early childhood development
• Occupational therapy
• Accounting and bookkeeping
• Youth development work