It has been an incredibly fast-paced and jam-packed first half of the year at the Anna Foundation. In a way, it feels like we made up for many of the opportunities we could not offer the children in the previous 2 years! This has taken admirable dedication from all of our staff members, going above and beyond what is required of them on a daily basis. I feel incredibly grateful to have this team of passionate people investing so much...
It is a well-known fact that raising and nurturing a child is a job for the entire community. As an organisation whose mission it is to support the holistic development of rural children, this principal is fittingly applicable to our work, and so we are extremely thankful to our community for their support! From winter clothing drives, to book donations, to pillows, puzzles and parenting support – our partners continue to be incredibly generous. Winter in the winelands is a trying...
The Anna Foundation’s afterschool programmes are located on various working farms throughout the Western Cape, and the majority of our learners are farm workers’ children. Having grown up on the farm, the children are accustomed to sights of the surrounding vineyards and the visitors entering the tasting rooms, but many of them have not put together the entire puzzle of what exactly is happening around them. This past term, we collaborated with our agricultural partners to organize educational farm tours...
Community work is a team effort! In the first semester of 2022, the Anna Foundation have had the incredible pleasure of welcoming a handful of students from the University of Stellenbosch on board as helpful members of our volunteer team. These willing students have happily chosen to invest their time, skills and resources into the lives of our learners in a variety of different ways. Estelle de Villiers is a post-graduate psychology student who volunteers every Tuesday afternoon by hosting an...
Mariska Goliath is a member of our scholarship programme who we met at one of our farm projects in 2010. Although Mariska was only in pre-primary at the time, we recognized a resilient twinkle in her eye despite her difficult family circumstances and lack of opportunities. Since then, we have been able to enrol and support her through 11 years of schooling at Stellenbosch Primary and Stellenbosch High School. We have been so proud to watch her grow into a...
The curtains of 2022 have opened to reveal many magical adventures for the children of the Anna Foundation. The wonderful people of The Playhouse Theatre and The Drama Factory in Somerset West have set aside theatre seats for our children to attend four fantastic productions this past term. First off, the younger children from our Neethlingshof after-school went diving into the depths of The Playhouse Theatre to learn the tale of The...
The Anna Foundation has been an official charity of the Absa Cape Epic for almost ten years, and this partnership has proudly continued to grow in 2022! The world-renowned mountain biking event took place between 20-27 March this year, and the Anna Foundation were thrilled to be a part of it all from registration day at Lourensford, through to the finish line at Val de Vie. The children of our after-schools spent many an afternoon in February...
Within this first term of 2022, there has been much exciting movement in the Anna Foundation team. In the head office, we have welcomed Marike Pieterse as our new Education Coordinator and Project Manager. With eight years of primary school teaching experience, Marike has a passion to improve, enhance and enrich the education practices in our country. Marike has brought with her a revitalising energy to our education programme that has been contagious amongst the...
Our partnership with Wonderdal is one which began in 2019 and has continued to blossom since. Wonderdal is a state-of-the-art interactive edutainment centre for children on the beautiful Hazendal Estate. The wonderful world of Wonderdal is a magical and educational experience, with the power to open a child’s mind to the worlds of science, nature and learning in a new way. Not all children have the resources to access this wonderful world of...
Running is one of the three pillars of our 3 Rs Programme, so it is only fitting that our children LOVE TO RUN! And certainly nothing has changed in 2022. The Anna Foundation children have already taken part in three running events this year, and plan to do many more. Trailfun hosts a league of trail running events on various wine farms throughout the Western Cape on Saturday mornings, and they have kindly hosted the Anna Foundation in three of...