The famous South African cleric and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, has given his support for The Unlimited Child by agreeing to become the organisation’s patron. Often described as South Africa’s moral compass, Archbishop Tutu has a great passion for children and a lifelong history of fighting for the oppressed. Under his patronage, The Unlimited Child will continue to supply crèches with expertly designed educational toys and practical care-giver training.
Archbishop Tutu comments: “Children epitomise all that is good, pure and hopeful. Sadly, for millions of children the world is a harsh, uncompromising and frightening place. Organisations such as The Unlimited Child, of which I am proud and honoured to be a patron, are a vital link in providing education and learning. I ask all South Africans to help change the lives of our children and ultimately the future of this country by supporting The Unlimited Child.”
Established in 2008, The Unlimited Child actively addresses the dire need for early childhood development in South Africa. The work being done by The Unlimited Child is grounded on studies that have proven that unless children aged 0 to seven years are exposed to the correct inputs such as learning colours and shapes through educational toys, their potential in life will be severely stunted. For example, if the average child has a potential of 10, then a child with no early childhood development will only reach a potential of 2. Not even the best teachers in the world will be able to impact on these childrens’ potential. They will always have a potential of 2. They are untrainable and destined for a life of poverty as they will never have the ability to learn a skill.
Currently, there are over 6 million children aged 0 to 7 in South Africa that have little to no access to early childhood development – if they are to have a future, urgent intervention is needed.
The Unlimited Child provides immediate impact on the lives of young children by supplying crèches with educational toys specifically designed to develop cognitive and fine motor skills in pre-school children. At the same time, crèche care-givers are trained to ensure they know how to maximise the use of the toys and create stimulating learning environments.
A simple model that is easily duplicated, The Unlimited Child has already successfully reached over 124 crèches that together care for just under 7 000 children and has provided training for more than 310 care-givers.
“The results have been nothing short of remarkable,” says Belinda Young, director of The Unlimited Child. “In every single case where The Unlimited Child has provided resources and learning, parents and neighbours see immediate changes in their children and crèches experience an influx of children with numbers doubling, trebling and in some cases even quadrupling.”
The Unlimited Child performs regular, on-going evaluation and monitoring to ensure that the equipment is used properly. Thus, the initial scope of the project has expanded to emphasise long term sustainability, empowerment and life-long learning.“Deny a child pre-school learning and you deny our country a future. Through The Unlimited Child, we have the means in our hands to truly shift this country and its children’s lives, now and forever. It is a great honour to have Archbishop Tutu supporting this initiative as his patronage will help us to achieve the greater ambitions we have set for the organisation,” says Young.
Funded by The Unlimited, a company based in KwaZulu -Natal in South Africa, The Unlimited Child aims to reach 25 000 crèches throughout South Africa over the next five years, but additional funding and duplication of the model by other organisations is needed to achieve this. “Only then, can we ensure that thousands more children enter school with ready minds and the capacity to reach their full potential,” Young says.
To date The Unlimited Child has reached over 200 crèches, over 500 caregivers and has changed the lives of 12 000 children. A growing organisation that’s only been operating for two years, The Unlimited Child aims to reach 1.25-million children throughout South Africa by 2016.
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