Bursaries – A success story with plants: Charne Malan

By Juanita du Preez

The goal of Solidarity Helping Hand is to prepare youth for the world of work.

Flip Buys, executive head of the Solidarity Movement, said that if a minority wants to survive in a majority environment, they will have to excel in knowledge. Helping Hand’s Afrikaans Bursary Institute (ABI) is a good instrument to actualise this statement.

The ABI now manages and administrates 56 bursary funds in total. In 2011, 23 new bursary funds were created and 11 full community bursaries were established exclusively to serve needy students in their region or branch.

In 2012, an amount of R7 million will be paid out for study loans; each loan has to be paid back interest-free after completion of the student’s studies.

These numbers may sound impressive, but one can truly realise the value of it only when one hears from students in their own words what the bursary loan meant to them.

Charné Malan is such a student.

I am studying for a BSc degree with Geology and Botany as majors and has just started as second-year student at the North-West University. It is a three-year course, but I would also like to study for my honours degree later on.

In 2011, I received a bursary loan of R12 000 from the Rapport Education Fund.

What an unbelievable year! Thank goodness for the Reception and Introduction Programme that was presented by the Pukke. Without it, I would have been totally lost on campus. I made friends quickly and felt at home while we were folding little flowers for the RAG.

Botany became my favourite subject. At school, I hated physics and struggled to pass it. At the PUK, I enjoyed it a lot and to my astonishment, I passed it with distinction! Chemistry, especially the practical part, is interesting, but definitely the most difficult of all my subjects.

I was blessed with wonderful lecturers in my first year and Prof Martie Coetzee (Geology) was my favourite. What a dear and down-to-earth person!

To stay in a student house was a huge adjustment. I longed for home terribly and as my parents live nine hours away from Potch, I could only go home four times. My biggest consolation was to go to church each Sunday. Student church is a wonderful experience!!

Here I really learned what hard work is; I’ve never had so much work before, but there was lots of fun too! My circle of friends is wonderful. We visit each other, console each other and have good, healthy fun.

Thank you so much for the financial support and care, as well as the fact that you made it possible for me to study for my future.

I can say in all honesty that 2011 helped me to grow up and become more responsible. I am seeing forward to 2012 with all its challenges!

By the grace of God, Rapport Education Fund has granted me a study loan of R15 000 for 2012 again. I am very grateful for this.