IkamvaYouth is an award-winning volunteer-driven academic support programme for township school youth in the final few years of their secondary school careers. IkamvaYouth enables these learners to access quality post-school opportunities and then return to help others to do the same.
IkamvaYouth’s two-fold objective is:
- assisting learners to lift themselves out of poverty through access to tertiary institutions or employment, and
- equipping these learners to help others to do the same.
- supplementary tutoring,
- career guidance and mentoring,
- computer literacy training,
- HIV awareness and life-skills development,
- winter school holiday sessions
- and creative expresssion programmes.
Branches: IkamvaYouth is largely volunteer-driven with 5 branches across South Africa in Khayelitsha, Nyanga, Masiphumelela (Western Cape), Cato Crest (KwaZulu-Natal) and Ivory Park (Gauteng) – the branch powered by SEF. IkamvaYouth mobilises volunteers, mostly university students, to tutor learners from township schools.
Impact: The results have been exceptional over the last four years with an 85-100% matric pass rate at all IkamvaYouth branches and over 60% of our Ikamvanite learners achieving access to tertiary institutions .
Sustainability: A major success of the IkamvaYouth model is the number of ex-learners who return as volunteers to tutor in the programme with nearly half the current volunteer base in the Western Cape comprising ex-learners.
Awards: Winner of the Mail & Guardian and Southern African Trust’s ‘2010 Drivers of Change’ Award in the Civil Society category. Runner-up in the Change Makers “Champions of Quality Education in Africa” Award in 2009.
Volunteer: To volunteer at the Gauteng branch, email: joe@ikamvayouth.org or go to our volunteer page for more information. To volunteer at one of our other branches click here.
To Learn More: visit the national IkamvaYouth website: www.ikamvayouth.org.
