As someone who takes an interest in the welfare of our boys and girls, you’ll be delighted to hear that they all did us proud last year.
While some achieved outstanding results in the classroom and on the sports field, others showed tremendous personal growth. We are so encouraged by your support of our counselling and care programmes that make these results possible. Thank you!
We have also been running a support group for children who have recently left our care – and have learnt valuable lessons about how to make this transition period less stressful for them. Global findings are that ‘youth who have left care’ feel cut off from the real world and often fearful to engage because of the (inevitable) institutionalised setting in which they were brought up.
Encouragingly, a small informal research study confirms that we are on par with international standards in terms of what our youth have achieved. But we need to create more opportunities to teach young people about building inter-dependent relationships, work readiness and other real world situations.
Our heartfelt thanks go to the volunteers and mentors who continue to create many ‘real life’ experiences for our youth, by taking them to workplaces, shops, movies and restaurants – as well as offering sports lessons and fun activities.
I also want to thank the many people who have helped improve our Home over the past year by donating paint and manpower to paint the walls, working in the vegetable garden and cleaning. Grateful thanks also to those who donated lovely Christmas gifts and activities, books, food, cleaning materials and toiletries. Your generosity is deeply encouraging.
Once again, thank you to our neighbours and the local community who donate items for our charity shop and who buy from the shop. It has been a wonderfully successful venture.
I wish you every blessing for 2019.