2015: Good causes
PURCO SA is a firm believer in the social and business value of contributing time and funds to good causes. Children’s wellbeing, mountain climbing and education are among the charity efforts we supported this year.
Kings Hope
The main organisation that we fund continually is Kings Hope Development Foundation, which feeds the hungry and supports people living with HIV/AIDS.
Its educational efforts give people useful skills, such as helping them grow food gardens to improve the nutrition of their families and make a profit from selling excess produce. Another important part of the Kings Hope work is counselling alcohol and drug abusers and counselling individuals facing emotional life challenges.
International Council for Open and Distance Education
Education is obviously close to PURCO SA’s heart, and this year we sponsored the 26th International Council for Open and Distance Education world conference. The conference was held in Sun City in October and hosted by UNISA. Speakers covered very relevant topics for the higher education sector, including the use of free software in education, trends in higher and technology-enabled learning, and staff development in the higher education sector.
Climbing Mt Fuji (#climb4NMMU)
We were also pleased to sponsor the efforts of Prof. Derrick Swartz, who climbed Mount Fuji to raise funds for academically deserving but financially needy students. Swartz is the Vice-Chancellor of Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, and his effort was part of the university’s 10th anniversary celebrations.
He climbed the 3.7 km Mount Fuji in Japan in August to raise funds for students at NMMU, and to highlight the challenges many students face in getting a tertiary qualification.
His climb raised more than R1 million, which is enough to give 10 students the opportunity to study for four years through the university’s Bursary Legacy Campaign.
To train for the gruelling two-day climb, the professor ran up to his office on the 18th floor of the university and down again every day.
Swartz spoke of the need for more financial support for poor students, especially within the Eastern Cape, the country’s poorest province. The R9.5 billion distributed by the government’s National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) does not meet national needs, and certainly not within NMMU, he said. “My view is that we must find ways of augmenting the pressurised resources. All of us have the capacity to make a difference.”
Girlology
Finally, PURCO SA also sponsored the North West University’s Girlology initiative in August at the Vaal Campus. The initiative during Women’s Month was designed to empower the next generation of South African women.
The Girlology campaign ran workshops in a collaboration between Kotex, Code Teen and the Directorate Student Counselling and Development, which aims to deal with issues facing young women such as HIV infection, rape, domestic violence, unmarried pregnancies and substance abuse. Interactive workshops were held around self-esteem, self-belief, self-worth and respect.
About 750 female students and local school learners took part, with more than 50 grade 10 and 11 learners from Suncrest High School in Vanderbijlpark bussed to the campus to attend the sessions.