Introduction to SAEP

I'm getting involved with an organization called South African Education and Environment Program (SAEP). SAEP has undertaken three basic tasks: providing and supporting creches (day care centers for 1-6 year olds) in the townships, creating tutoring programs in township high schools, and working with "gap-year" interns (students who have completed high school but failed one or more subjects on their graduation exams who have one year to study and pass those exams).

I went to visit a few of the creches yesterday and it was simultaneously heartbreaking and inspiring. The buildings are mostly constructed out of tin and cardboard; they are very small and rather rickety. Most of the creches have only three or four rooms, with kitchens for cooking and rooms for keeping the children. The creches open before 7 a.m. so that parents can drop off their children before taking public transportation to work and remain open until nearly 7 p.m. for parents to pick them up. The centers are very over-crowded, one of them had 192 children in only 3 rooms. There are few toys and books, the rooms seem bare. Most of the centers have little or no playground space and limited, poor toilet facilities. The conditions are, in short, tragic.

At the same time, the services being provided are a godsend. Most of the creches were founded by women who wished to help. SAEP simply works with those women to improve conditions, organize things, and provide funding. The parents are charged a small fee for the care of the children, but the directors also don't turn away children who can't pay. Despite lack of resources, the staffs manage to maintain remarkably good discipline and care, making sure that the children get regular meals and some education at the creches.

The children are amazing, though. When our group of seven college students entered, the children gazed at us with curiousity. They were eager to shake our hands, they waved and gave thumbs-up, and some even sang and played games with us. Despite the conditions around them, the children are like all the other children I've ever met.

I've decided to work one afternoon a week in a creche with the children, as well as spending an afternoon working in the SAEP offices doing my capstone project. I'm excited to work with an organization that is getting involved and trying to improve conditions through existing formats.