It may have taken her more than a decade, but Bergzicht Training alumnus, Nadia Andries (34), has finally found her calling and it happens to be a job that has helped her start her own business too. Before Nadia completed Bergzicht Training’s Edu Care Programme, she had been employed as a sales assistant at Shoprite,
The day that Nathalie Skippers (photo) signed up for a degree in social work, she may have inadvertently found her calling, but she had no idea then that a career spent helping others to empower themselves would fulfill her that much. “I come from Prieska in the Northern Cape. Social work was not even on
In 2015, Bergzicht Training alumnus and then unemployed Janet Damane opened her door to a complete stranger, an elderly, frail man who had been dropped on her doorstep and abandoned by his children. What she didn’t know at the time, was that this act of selflessness, while she herself was struggling, would help her find
Thanks to a generous donation from the German political research foundation, the Hanns Seidel Foundation, Bergzicht Training was recently able to produce a short video on how donors and volunteers, along with the Bergzicht team, are making an impact on impoverished communities by training poor, unemployed, unskilled or semi-skilled individuals from those communities.
In 2011, the then 29-year old Lungisa Dangisa left Umtata, a small town in the Eastern Cape, and travelled to the Western Cape in search of a job and a brighter future. However, upon arriving in Stellenbosch, he soon discovered that finding a job was not that easy. “While there are jobs in the
As Zakhona Mbelu (29) starts constructing the exact sandwich on the order slip in front of her at the Fedics-owned cafeteria at Sanlam’s headquarters in Bellville, she becomes completely engrossed in the task at hand. Yet her quiet demeanour belies the determination and tenacity she has developed over the years as well as her adventurous
After being unemployed for seven years, Nontuthuzelo Nqumana, 33, from Kayamandi in Stellenbosch was encouraged by her mom to improve her employability by registering for a few courses and programmes at Bergzicht Training. Little did she know that upon completing the iPOWER (Self-Empowering) Foundation Programme (previously Home Management), she would immediately be employed as a
After completing the Edu Care Programme at Bergzicht Training and countless job applications submitted to day and aftercare centres around the Western Cape, Danine van Rooi (29), took her own initiative and opened Little Miracles Day and Aftercare at her house in Rietpoel Street in Wesbank, Delft. The facility now caters to a growing need
For the last four years, local government and NGOs in Stellenbosch have joined hands to help change the fate of many poor, unskilled or semi-skilled, and unemployed youth in Stellenbosch and from the looks of it, that collaboration has been reaping many fruits. On 15 June, 13 students who completed Bergzicht Training’s City & Guilds’
Bergzicht Training graduates share stories of how their lives have changed thanks to the internationally recognised City & Guilds’ Professional Cooking and Food and Beverage Service Programme “I know my father would have been as excited as I am today and I know that he is smiling down at me. It was my father who
