Faith pushed one man to help people read
A walk in faith has taken a Somerset West-based man and his family around the world and back again to follow a divine injunction to help to rebuild God’s temple.
According to Campher Serfontein, after following a career in South Africa with SARS and then in Indonesia Tax for an Australian agency, he resigned from paying work to follow a received prophesy: “Within weeks I received a further confirmation in Scripture, Mark 1:17-18, where Jesus called some of His disciples where they were working with their fishing nets”, he explains, adding that He instructed them to leave their nets and follow Him. “His further instruction to me was to rebuild His temple….the people. I resigned the next day”, he says.
Within two months, Serfontein says he received a further “piece of the puzzle” to help him understand what he was about to do. That was to buy a reading centre in Somerset West. “I only later realised that reading would become the very basic skill we needed to teach children as part of the model to bring effective change in people and a community. We started with 15 grade three children and they all tested two levels below their school grade. The children’s reading was very slow with only about 50% comprehension until the programme”, he ends. Sir Lowry’s Primary School principal Rolan MacDonald always referred to that first group as the stars in the year and there was a clearly demonstrable success as a result of their participating in the reading programme.
Buoyed by the success of the reading programme (such improved results that the Department of Education awarded them a R29, 000 prize), they decided to write a curriculum for sustainability for pre- and primary school children.
They have developed a whole term’s material at present and also started to pilot the programme with the pre-school children. While Sustainability is not currently part of the curriculum, the programme’s aim, in the near future, is to pilot the programme in a school which will be treated as a special project for the learners. Learners have to put sustainability insights into practice in the school’s re-cycling programme and eco-classrooms.
According to Serfontein, Brazil is currently the only country teaching Sustainability as a subject, “so we are excited to soon pilot the “subject” and take the proposed curriculum to the decision makers”, he says.
The overall education programme assisted presently 625 children who received two sessions of focused literacy, numeracy and/or Early Childhood and Sustainability development per week.
Tru-Cape Fruit Marketing, the largest marketer of South African apples and pears, many from the Grabouw, Elgin area served by Sir Lowry’s Pass School, heard about this pilot programme while Marketing Director Conrad Fick, who knew Serfontein from work he had done at De Hoop School, mooted the topic while attending a Stellenbosch University Graduate School of Business course and supported the idea of teaching sustainability. “Today more than 50% of our youth are unemployed and the figure rises in rural areas. This means that unless sustainability skills that puts into context the reasons to maintain and protect natural resources, even when one’s own circumstances are dire, as they are for far too many people, are learned we won’t have a shot at a decent future for all.
“Tru-Cape is honoured to be associated with such a programme which fits with our own #GrowingPotential social media campaign to get youth to eat more fruit and vegetables and to develop skills to grow kitchen gardens in their homes.”
According to Serfontein Tru-Cape has invested R100, 000 into getting the project off the ground. Funds covered two full-time teaching staff and the development and printing of course materials. “270 children have directly benefitted from Tru-Cape’s support”, he says but adds that R350, 000 is still needed for the remainder of the year. “The monthly fee to teach these children at R77 per child will be R20790 while the development of the material for the course for the remainder of the year is around R350 000 so we need other generous benefactors to please step forward so that this important work can continue”, he ends
