Improving the hostel for Sinethemba Students
Dirkiesdorp February 3, 2011
The Dining Hall and new kitchen, washroom and laundry facilities at the Sinethemba hostel for girls have almost been completed. More improvements are planned for the boys as well. In total, an investment of over R1 million has been made in upgrading and renovating the old Sinethemba hostel since June 2010. Throughout this year, renovations and upgrading will continue - step-by-step!
Our main aim: to create a true home away from home for all our learners!
For many years, Themba Trust was not able to invest into the proper maintenance of its hostel facilities, owing to lack of income. But in 2007 planning started to slowly, but surely improve the facilities at the Themba hostels for boys and girls. When the change came to move both boys and girls that needed hostel accommodation to Sinethemba school, the opportunity was also given to start with these much-needed renovations in 2010. The main aim is to create a true home away from home for all our learners - those whose parents are able to pay for them to stay at Themba, as well as those who are dependent on donors from Germany and the USA to attend the Themba boarding school.
Photo: The old kitchen at Sinethemba was completely broken out and rebuilt from scratch inside the space available. This was done through funding made available by the Otto-Hahn-Gymnasium in Germany. A new kitchen, storeroom, washroom and laundry area was built into the old space.
 Photo: The new kitchen includes 3-phase electricity to make it possible to use modern food processing equipment in future. This photo shows a view of the new kitchen from the new food serving area and passage to the dining hall. This is the same area as in the above photo. Throughout the renovation and upgrading process environmentally friendly materials and processes are being used. For instance, the new kitchen features a solar heater for hot water. This water is used for washing, as well as for hot beverages. In this way Themba students learn about the benefits of using alternative energy sources and become more aware of the challenges our environment is facing.
More improvements have been done or are underway. These include:
- Each learner receives a new mattress, duvet & pillow, sheets, pillowcases and duvet covers on registration. These items carry the student number of the learner and are used by the learner during the full duration of his or her stay at Themba. Full-paying learners pay for these items. Donors are sought to cover the costs of these items for each learner on a scholarship.
- From 2011, each learner also gets to use crockery and cutlery supplied by the Themba Trust. These items are looked after by the learners themselves and are counted after each use, to avoid loss.
- Each hostel - the one for boys and the one for girls - has been equipped with a large flat-screen television set and Dstv subscription. This is to ensure that all learners can enjoy watching TV during the allocated time, while also benefitting from educational programming made available on Dstv.
- Solar panels have been installed for the showers at the Sinethemba girls hostel, as well as aerated shower-heads. This helps to make sure that all learners can enjoy hot water at a minimum cost. A shower schedule has been introduced at both boys and girls hostels to allow enough time for water to heat up in between shower periods. This helps to make sure that no one has to stand under a cold shower!
- Some of the future investments in the infrastructure of the hostels include: better security through new fencing and lighting; development of outside garden areas for better use by learners; paved walkways between the dormitories, ablution blocks, dining halls and school. In some of these improvements learners themselves will be involved, so that they may learn basic home maintenance skills.
Themba needs help to further improve the hostel facilities.
Interested donors are welcome to email the Themba Trust's Chief Executive Officer,
Reinhild Niebuhr, at |
