“The Unlimited Child” has already helped 1 million South African children… and its aim is to make sure that no child is left behind!
KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa (03 August 2022) – Last night, I attended a launch, and it was spectacular! The Unlimited – a South African company that has been around since 1994 and has grown to a R1 Billion business a year – launched its first big campaign, which is all about helping our country rise by creating employment for South Africans.
You see, they employ over 2,000 people but have also created over 1,000 jobs outside of their core business through their leadership program, which they want to duplicate ON A LARGE SCALE.
It’s really quite something, but not even the reason I was really invited.
Quietly in the background, the company has also been working tirelessly (over the last 14 years) to fix an epidemic in our country that desperately needs attention. They founded an NGO funded by the business and several partners to focus on “Early Childhood Development”.
The reality is that the majority of South African children do not get access to what should be a basic human right.
By the time Grade 1 starts, these little kids have never had the opportunity to learn about numbers, or reading or even basic motor skills… and this loss will (and does) impact the rest of their lives. In fact, in South Africa, 64% of children who start Grade 1 will not finish school.
But this company wanted to change that.
And so they did (and plan to do even more).
In the last decade, the team crafted incredible curriculums (for nursery school teachers to follow), wrote children’s books, created toys to help with cognitive thinking, charts to learn new things, and play mats… all to work congruently with the daily learnings.
If a child does not have access to ECD, their potential in life will be a 3/10 with no possibility of ever reaching a 10/10, and no teacher in the world will be able to change this. Our work is urgent if we are to change our country for the better,” Potgieter continues.
If the early foundations of the Three Rs – Reading, Writing and Arithmetic – are not formed, a child will experience a lifetime of challenges.
“A child under the age of six holds the greatest promise for change in our society. By investing in children from a young age, we invest in a society that stands the chance to thrive in 20 years’ time.
They then donated all these resources to nursery schools while giving the teachers the support they needed to not only teach these kids the skills to be “school ready” but ultimately help them thrive throughout the rest of their lives. And they have already helped 1 million children through the 3,200 nursery schools they support!!!
You might not think this is a big thing, but let me tell you… this is a game-changer in our country. The kids that have been through the program are excelling at school – like over-the-top achievers!!! Having the basic skills means that they can learn even more. And they want to!!! It is really unbelievable.
“Our model is shown to have the best impact in taking children from being at risk of never being school ready to being without a doubt school ready. From the outset, our unique model was developed with an ability to scale, by being easily duplicated across any geographic context. This is why today we operate across sub-Saharan Africa, having launched in Lesotho and Zimbabwe in 2021,” explains Candice Potgieter, CEO of The Unlimited Child.
And their plan is to grow this “Unlimited Child” initiative to an even greater scale. They want to roll this “blueprint to learning” out to every single underprivileged child in South Africa.
Every. Single. One.
Imagine what that would do for our country???
They say we need to look for the helpers in times of tragedy.
Well, here’s a story of one company being exactly that.
To 1 million children already.
Just wow.
To learn more about this initiative – or get involved – click this link.
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