META helps gear pupils for success

Pupils at Magau Secondary School promised a team of motivators, educators and the parents that they would work towards achieving a 100% matric pass in the 2018 academic year.

This was said after the Magau Education Turn Around team (META) donated study material to the value of R160 000 to the Grade 12 class last Tuesday. The team, comprising the school’s alumni and some business people, contributed money to compile past Grade 12 examination question papers and memorandums from 2010 to 2017, so that the pupils could use them in conjunction with the set texts.

“We urge you to use the examination question papers and memorandum books as often as you can so that you familiarise yourselves with the exams,” said META’s representative, Dr Ndanduleni Tseisi. “They teach you how to approach and answer set questions during exams.”

The event turned more into what became a motivational session for pupils to focus on their studies and work harder. Tseisi gave an illustration about success with reference to his own life. He stated that he had worked hard to ensure that he was the second doctor to ever come out of Magau village.

“So far, we have around five individuals who went on to become doctors,” he said. “We need more doctors across all disciplines from our village. We are here to tell you that it is possible to be successful through education and not through stealing other people’s properties.”

He said that the ball was in the pupils’ court to make sure that there was infrastructural development in the village. “So, avoid or stay away from social media, because it just wastes your time,” he said. “Set long-term goals and short-term goals, which are educationally derived. It pains my heart when I drive to this village on Saturdays and see youths who are not even 17 years of age carrying an opened one litre bottle of beer, consuming it like nobody’s business. I just think: Where is this young person’s future heading to?”

Pastor Willie Mphilo told pupils that he had had a case where a pupil was addicted to drugs and alcohol. “It was a tragic case, but I was so glad that I helped him to quit and focus on life,” he said.

The pupil’s representative, Bontle Mangena thanked the META team and the school for continuing to support them in their quest for attaining better education.

Date:21 April 2018

By: Tshifhiwa Mukwevho

Tshifhiwa Given Mukwevho was born in 1984 in Madombidzha village, not far from Louis Trichardt in the Limpopo Province. After submitting articles for roughly a year for Limpopo Mirror's youth supplement, Makoya, he started writing for the main newspaper. He is a prolific writer who published his first book, titled A Traumatic Revenge in 2011. It focusses on life on the street and how to survive amidst poverty. His second book titled The Violent Gestures of Life was published in 2014.

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