MOBILISING ALUMNI

Archbishop Ndungane (far left) meets with members of the Lemana Alumni Association during February 2009.

In the HSRP Strategic Planning meeting held in January 2010, alumni of the historic schools were once more identified as crucial stakeholders. The HSRP was advised to further increase efforts to pull more alumni into the project. Although our inaugural alumni dinner in early 2009 was a success, limited follow-up had taken place and it was necessary to generate more impetus. Due to the limited capacity of the HSRP office, we engaged a consultant organisation, Masakhe Communications, to help us mobilise more alumni and also to introduce the HSRP to more business organisations which might see value in partnering with us to restore schools.

In late February I attended and addressed a meeting of the Lemana Alumni Association in Limpopo. I briefed them on the progress of the HSRP in general and impressed upon them the importance of their role in the revitsalisation of Lemana itself. I suggested that an alumni gathering be held at the school later in 2010 and they undertook to suggest a future date.

We held a meeting in early March 2010 for the alumni of Healdtown, kindly sponsored by Citadel, a Sandton-based finance company. This was a valuable information and briefing session which saw the exchange of a number of ideas and was addressed by, among others, the present principal. The meeting raised the interest of the attending alumni, and an alumni task team was set up. It was planned that a further gathering on the Healdtown campus be held later in 2010.