NHS pairs with Bantfwana Phambili to bring secondary education to South Africa
October 28, 2015
Everyone deserves a good education. It is crucial in the world we live in to get the best education possible, but not every student gets the same opportunities as others, and because of that, Stillwater’s National Honors Society, joins Bantfwana Phambili to help give African students a chance at a secondary education.
Bantfwana Phambili is an organization whose name means children first in Swati. This organization is about uplifting African communities and helping students get administration to universities, colleges and other secondary educational opportunities. NHS joined this organization to help raise money for the underprivileged students of South Africa.
National Honor Society is an elite national organization that was created to acknowledge outstanding high school students who can partake in service work, grow in character and show great leadership. NHS is the schools organization that plans all of the events such as food drive, blood drive and Coffeehouse. Students are selected to be in this group based on their GPA, they must have a 3.85 and are then expected to keep up with this grade point average along keeping up with a certain number of service hours.
“NHS is a club that we go around and volunteer doing different things. We do the blood drives and the Coffeehouse and then a lot of other similar volunteering opportunities,” senior Jane Delahunt a member of NHS said.
Last year’s Coffeehouse raised $4000-5000 and all of it was donated to the organization Bantfwana Phambili. NHS more future plans for raising money to donate to this cause.
“We’ve been throwing a couple ideas around, and we might have books and brochures at our future events, like Coffeehouse. We have also been thinking about running a fundraiser through Chipotle or other local businesses,” senior Mary Norkol a NHS member said.
Bantfwana Phambili’s only mission is to help give as many students as possible the luxury of a secondary education. This helps ensure that the underprivileged children of South Africa get an opportunity for a better life.
“They have put over 150 students through school from the Mpumalanga province in South Africa. Many of the students are orphans and they receive $100 a year,” senior Cela Peterson a NHS member said.
Each South African student needs $100 to afford everything from their books to their uniforms. The goal that NHS is trying to accomplish is to get as much money as they can to continue to help more and more students get the education they deserve.
“Since it’s our first year working with them we don’t have a set goal just to sponsor as many students as possible,” Peterson added.
Small things make big differences. We take the privileges we have for granted, to the kids in South Africa $100 is not just an education, it is a future. This organization is not just helping kids go to school it is much more, it gives these kids a chance and shows them someone cares.
“$100 to us that sounds like nothing, like come on, we go out to a movie and dinner as a couple and that’s $100, but to them, that’s a substantial amount of money that could change their lives,” NHS Advisor Chris Engler said.
Lauren LeBourgeois • Nov 24, 2015 at 6:50 pm
This article was so good. I learned a lot about NHS and their goals. I am glad you wrote this, it was written so well. It educates and informs readers. It also inspires readers to want to help those in need around the world.