‘Take a Girl Child to Work Day’ 2015

“Girls who are educated, healthy and free can transform their communities and pass on the benefits to their children, and their children’s children.” – Graҫa Machel

It was Cell C‘s ‘Take a Girl Child to Work Day’ yesterday. We were honoured to have hosted five girls from Thandokhulu Secondary School: Nandipha Jacobs, Aviwe Sonwabo,  Yolanda Lupuwana, Fezeka Mnqwazi and Aluthando Ndzongo.

We started with  a round of introductions and asked the girls what they would like to be/study after school. Their answers ranged from IT to law and the medical profession. Amongst the girls there was also a budding writer/poet.

Each of the FunDza and Cover2Cover team members had the pleasure of doing an exercise  depicting their roles within the organisation.

A lesson in social media. Which, in this case of course, involved a selfie.

Ros Haden then took the girls through all the steps neccessary to publish a story on the FunDza mobi platform.  The girls read Chapter 1 of this week’s story. It was super exciting, because they got to read it before anyone! They had to format the story; then translate all the isiXhosa words into English and finally come up with a question with which to engage the readers.

After this exercise they spent time with Tamara Veriava from Cover2Cover going through all the steps involved in print publishing: from the conception of a story, to writing, proof reading, type setting, back to proofreading as well as the nitty gritties of the cover design, marketing, sales and channels of distribution.

The day ended with lunch and a certificate ceremony. What an honour and a pleasure to have had these girls here. As FunDza’s Phoebe Sibomana noticed: “It was so inspiring to see these girls take this so seriously. Even though it was not necessarily one of their first choices, they were open to understanding the importance of reading and writing.”

Thank you Cell C. Thank you Thandokhulu Secondary School.