Celebrating South Africa's Young Social Innovators

enke: Make Your Mark celebrated the hard work and achievements of the 176 high-school  participants of their 2012 enke: Youth Award program at a recent graduation-styled event called the “enke: Innovation Day”. This event was designed to recognise and celebrate these young South Africans who had implemented innovative community action projects to address social issues within their communities.

Bongani Gqweta and Bongani Pontsana are two Grade 12 students from Khayelitsha, Cape Town, who were concerned about the poor science pass rate amongst their peers and the general lack of enthusiasm for science subjects amongst the majority of students at their school.

They weren’t sure how to go about tackling this issue, until they participated in the 2012 enke: Youth Award Program. The enke: Youth Award Program is an initiative, of enke: Make Your Mark a youth development organization whose mission is to connect young people who are passionate about changing their world, equip them with skills for success and inspire a bias towards action.

The enke: Youth Award Program focuses on youth leadership, entrepreneurship and inspiration and is an opportunity for high school learners to develop their personal leadership skills, harness their potential and be challenged to inspire and empower others in their own communities to create sustainable social change and innovation.

As part of the program, Grade 10 and 11 participants are challenged to implement a project to tackle a social issue in their own communities - a Community Action Project (CAP). These projects were a result of nine months’ worth of training, commitment and hard work by participants of the 2012 enke: Youth Award program.

After going through training at the enke Forum in Cape Town, Bongani and Bongani returned to Khayelitsha empowered and inspired to share their passion and high esteem for science subjects. They formed a team and established the first ever science club at their high school (Masiyile Senior Secondary School), as well as providing peer- to-peer tutoring in science subjects to their classmates through an after-school study club.

Through support from the Australian High Commission, enke: Make Your Mark is able to provide financial support to participants in the enke: Youth Award Program through a seed-funding project called the enke: Incubator Fund. Bongani and Bongani, as well as 15 other projects.

When the opportunity arose for enke: Youth Award Program participants to apply for seed-funding grants to provide further support to their community action project, the Bonganis’ (as they are affectionately known) where one of the 20 project groups selected to be recipients.  They shrewdly spent their grant on laboratory equipment such as conical flasks and Bunsen burners to afford their peers and fellow schoolmates the practical and hands-on science experience that is not available to many learners in under-resourced schools.

As part of the enke: Youth Award program,  “It’s a daunting task to implement a project within your community, to motivate your peers to participate, as well as remain positive in the face of countless problems, “ commented Rufaro Mudimu, Program Manager at enke: Make Your Mark.

“The 2013 enke: Innovation Days were tangible reminders of some of the outstanding stories of achievement and commitment shared by the young learners and their personal experiences whilst executing their community action projects. enke is determined to make sure that South Africa knows about young leaders that are taking innovative approaches to the challenges that pervade or social and education systems,” she said.

It’s not just the Bonganis’ - other examples of inspired youth are Sesi Selemolela (Malusi Secondary School, Limpopo) who started the first  chess club at her school to promote logic and reasoning skills, and Gareth Kieck, Ricky Huges & Zane Weir (Westville Boys’ High School, KwaZulu-Natal) who provided remedial lessons in Maths, English and Science to their peers at an under-resourced school within their community.. 

These are just 3 examples of the 95 projects initiated from the 176 learners who participated in the 2012 enke: Youth Award program. These 3 projects also formed part of the 20 projects that qualified for the R2000 grants provided through the 2012 enke: Incubator Fund Grant Project which was financially supported, courtesy of the Australian Government.

The 2013 enke: Innovation Day’s, hosted in Johannesburg and Cape Town, were momentous events that reinforced that young South Africans are empowered, equipped and inspired to provide lasting positive impact on their communities and society-at-large.