Umlazi School lacks basic services.

By: Sthembile Ngcobo

Driveway leading up into Inkonikoni Senior Primary School.
by: Sthembile Ngcobo.

The sound of children laughing, singing and learning can be heard from quite a distance before reaching Inkonkoni Senior Primary School.

It’s an early spring morning just before 7:30am, but the school yard is already packed with hundreds of children. Like every other primary school you can feel the excitement of a new day in the air. “I love coming to school,” says 12 years old Amahle Msani. “It is a place where I learn and play with my friends,” she explains.

Inkonikoni Senior Primary School is located in Umlazi V section. The school starts from grade 5 and ends at grade seven. This school was made into a senior primary so that it could accommodate a smaller number of grades with a large number of pupils. The school falls under the category of poor and not well maintained schools that can be identified in most township communities.

The atmosphere surrounding the school and the actual school building are two very different things. The cold red brick that the school is built with and the endless grey corridors have a dull discouraging effect that only students who attends this school can overcome. There is little or no grass for the children to play. The school ground is a completely eroded and is a hazardous place for the children to do any sporting activities on. The classrooms are over populated, small, pale yellow coloured rooms, with about 55 pupils to one teacher. There is also no security at the school gate to enforce the safety of the pupils.

The reason being for the school to be in this category could be the lack of funding, crime and of pure negligence of the schools management and also the community.

Funding

The school is dependent on government funding as a means to make ends meet at the end of each month. The lights, water and electricity are paid with this money. The school cannot expect much from the payment of school fees as it only charges R80 a month.

Students who come to this school are mostly from the poverty stricken community surrounding it said school Principal Mr. Mkhize. Since we all know that they come from a poor background we can’t expect them to pay a higher amount in school fees. “A high number of the kids here are either orphaned or their parents are unemployed,” he said.

The schools property is also rented out to the different church groups that use it as a place where they offer their Sunday services. The school hosts about 6 of these church groups and that only accumulates to R600 a month as they all pay R100 a month.

Church leader of the Twelve Apostolic Church Mrs Zondi said that the church uses the school for their smaller church meeting but for the big one they have a main church building. She also talked about the poor facilities of the school and also highlighted the fact that they as the church people and other students clean the school building as the school has no cleaners. “If we are lucky we will come Sunday morning to find the classes cleaned by the students who were here Friday,” she said. “A school is a place for children to learn and set their minds free, it should not be a place where they are burdened with the responsibility of having to do labour around it,” she added.

Donations

The school also receives donations from some members of the community and as well as Nurturing Orphans of Aids for Humanity (Noah).

Children from the different Schools supported by
Noah, wasingtheir plates after their daily meal
 at Inkonikoni Primary Scool.
sourced from iol.com

Noah is a non-profit organisation that was founded in 2000 by Dr. Gregory Ash in KwaZulu-Natal. Dr Ash and his team identified the rise in number of children who were left without any one due to HIV and AIDS. It is established with the spirit of Ubuntu in mind.

This organisation runs a feeding scheme at the school; it caters for pupils of Inkonikoni primary school and as well as other orphaned pupils from the nearby school.

Vuyiswa Mtshali one of the volunteers who cook and dish for the pupils said that there is a lot of students who come here to eat. “For some pupils this one meal that they get here is the only meal that they will have for the day,” she said. She also talked about the change that the organisation has brought to the lives of the children and to the community as a whole.

Crime

Any development plans that the school has tried to implement has been ripped down by the high crime rate in the community.

Theft ranging from windows, door handles, and the fence around the school, school furniture and computers has raped the school from its potential ofoffering its pupil’s quality education. That fact that there is no security watching the school makes it easy for the thugs to come in and rade the school.

There is no solid explanation why children should study under such harsh conditions.

It is now 2pm and the schools main entrance is decorated with the sky blue colour of the pupils’ uniform. The school building is now back to its dull form as the day dies out and the pupils head home.

“My sister used to attend at this school and today she is a nurse, so I will keep coming here and working hard maybe one day I will be like her, said grade 7 pupil, Yanga Dlamini. Before she runs along to join her friends waiting for her across the road she turns and says “Our school is not that bad, its way better than the one we come from.” She says this referring to the harsher conditions experienced before coming to this school.

“Pupils need to adjust their mind sets and rise above the poverty that’s within our school and this community, said Mr Mkhize whiles waving goodbye.