“PNPS is very different to the schools I worked at before: we didn’t have parents supporting other parents”, says Crystal, her eyes moist, as she explained what she, as PNPS bursar, has witnessed.
She
goes on: “Here we even have ex-PNPS pupils giving donations for current
children’s school fees. I never heard of that in previous schools.”
We
were sitting in the library, myself with Crystal and Tania (PNPS Business
Manager), as I was seeking to understand what financial inclusion looks like at
PNPS. Certainly, reading the dry budget figures hasn’t allowed me to grasp the
culture of sharing that seems to permeate the PNPS parent and staff community.
It turns out that there are multiple layers of sharing happening at our school.
About
10 years ago all Early Act fundraising went to charities. However, staff
realised that there was significant need amongst the school families, and decided
to allocate 20% of the Early Act income towards caring for the PNPS children.
This is now known as the “Inhouse Early Act Fund” which helps to buy shoes, school
bags and stationery for families going through a rough time. One year it helped
purchase a birthday gift for a child where the family was under real financial
strain. The fund also supports staff members in need: from providing
refreshments for one staff member’s husband’s funeral to accessing emergency
medical treatment for a staff member who arrived at work just having been
stabbed.
Crystal explains that this ethos of being mindful of one another’s needs is also reflected in the sharing between parents and families. Prior to the Solidarity Fund, Tania reports that there were children whose school fees were being paid for by other people. Each of these situations was different: sometimes there was an agreement between two families, other times it was through anonymous giving. Tania helps facilitate these sharing relationships and care is taken to ensure that the child or the family are not made to feel like recipients of charity, but that their dignity is honoured.
Sometimes parents help each other in smaller ways: Tania was asked by one parent to move the credit on their account to that of a fellow parent who they knew was really struggling during Covid. Last year the Grade 7 parents initiated a fundraiser to ensure that all the children could get their special Grade 7 jackets. Tania reflects: “We, in the finance department, get the privilege of seeing this incredible generosity, but I know in some grades support happens that doesn’t even come through the school.”
In
response to a particular desperate situation, the school launched a specific
campaign called #KeepThemTogether to help a foster-care mother of four children
at PNPS. Their overseas funding had been abruptly cut due to the global Covid
crisis, leaving this mother without a way to pay school fees. The fund was
called #KeepThemTogether because having the school fees sponsored would mean
that the foster carer could manage to keep all the four children with her.
Though they are not siblings they have grown up together and have become a
family to each other. It would be a significant emotional rupture should they
have to be moved to other foster families. Through the support of 14
contributors, the school fees for the four children were covered for 2020 and
2021. This year #KeepThemTogether aims to raise R68 791 for the remaining
three.
The
PNPS School Governing Body and Finance Management team are committed to keeping
school fees affordable in order for every family to pay their share, and
thus would prefer not to raise school fees for everyone in order to subsidise fee
exemptions. Hence, there is this intentionality to fundraise and provide
sharing opportunities for those who have capacity to help another family.
The
sharing culture moves beyond the boundaries of the school with the Early Act
fundraising which supports several charities, thereby allowing children to
spread their care wider than their immediate friends and family.
The
PNPS management team, being acutely aware of the deep inequalities in
education, also seeks to share beyond the school’s family. PNPS is a proud
partner of Tomorrow Trust to whom they give access to PNPS classrooms and
sports facilities. Tomorrow Trust provides winter and summer school for
children from previously discriminated communities by bringing them to PNPS
during the holidays for extended educational support where they receive food
and excellent teaching from volunteer teachers.
Inclusion
is broader than creating belonging for those with different learning abilities,
cultures, racial and gender identities, and religious backgrounds, it is also
about economic access. Financial inclusion is not charity, rather recognises
that it is an opportunity for the whole school to grow, learn and become more
compassionate – which according to African-American Civil Rights activist
Coretta Scott King is the real measure of a community: “The greatness of a
community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its
members.”
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