| Mural done by one of the alumni |
Zac Smith of Papillon Charity (
| Classroom at the facility |
Daily, I drive past the premises where I parked my car, and I never knew what lurked behind the closed doors. Once in a while, I hear about the project on the radio, but I have never actually paid any attention to it because of my busy schedule and life. But I have always wanted to give back, I have never liked that we in this country of South Africa have so much to give but due to, in my case, time management issues we rarely do.
But when Zac for the third time messaged about the visit, I rearranged my meetings in such a way as to not miss the opportunity again. That morning I still needed to pick people up from the airport, but I made my way to the facility.
| Classroom at the facility |
As mentioned at the beginning of the post, I was completely overwhelmed by the work being done here. Their approach to education is something I have thought about for many years. It goes against the grain of the current education system in this country of ours. To sum it up in a sentence:
You cannot expect that a fish can climb a tree, and neither can you expect an elephant to survive in the middle of the ocean.
The one-size-fits-all approach in modern education (in South Africa) actively excludes so many students, especially artistic students.
| The Artroom |
Zac and the others showed me the art room. Hanging on the wall were the children's artworks. Raw talent. Modern education does not provide children with adequate art education. Even in elite schools, it is treated as an extra module. But here, art education is provided to children from an early stage and age. Various children have exclaimed that they are not good at it, but their approach is brilliant in my opinion: show the children a picture of some famous artist, like Picasso, who did some rudimentary stuff and tell them how much it sells at auction; all of the children want to draw immediately! Here are some of the work up close:
| Art by the students 1 |
| Art by the students 2 |
| Art by the students 3 |
| Art by the students 4 |
| Art by the students 5 |
| Art by the students 6 |
| Art by the students 7 |
Art is just one aspect of their teaching and learning approach. Education is seen as holistic. It teaches and showcases to them that there is more than poverty, or life on the streets. It showcases to them that one can make something of yourself in this very strange world we find ourselves in.
Why? Because the people at this facility recognize potential from the start. Modern education, I would argue, across the globe only recognize a handful of people and students who thence excel. Poverty unfortunately excludes the vast majority of these students from ever excelling in a world governed by money. But in this enclave, students are seen from the start as harboring potential in whatever field they excel in. Normal school education will not see the artistic potential of a student, and schools without funding will exclude them even more. But the work Zac does in cooperation with others is one small step in the right direction. One story in particular stayed with me. The student did not succeed in the normal school system and was not doing so well (especially emotionally). However, upon entering this facility, the psychologists who help out there came to realise that the boy has an incredibly high IQ. The way they found out about it was via the art classes that acted as a natural therapy for him. Various forms of art therapy exist, and via the artistic process the psychologists found about his incredible mind. But the normal school system disregarded him.
If we could only have more of this type of work then maybe we could begin to work against the ill effects of society.
I hope you enjoyed this post and the virtual visit with me to this amazing place. I hope you can also see the potential in our youth who was lucky to have found their way into this facility. I also hope to work with them in the future and provide them with what I have to offer.
The musings and writings in this post are my own. The photographs were kindly provided by