Social Responsibility
The Amy Biehl Foundation is a non-profit organisation, based in Cape Town, whose programmes are designed to develop and empower 5-18 year old youth in the impoverished townships, contribute to community building efforts, give children hope and a brighter future and alleviate HIV Aids, poverty, gangs, violence and crime. This is achieved by providing educational and cultural activities that offer students healthy alternatives to idleness and all the negative influences in the townships and unlocks their creative talent with the aim of giving them opportunities to become future leaders, entrepreneurs and well rounded citizens in a global society. Our programmes reach over 1,500 children every week, and include:
• After School Care
• Music, Including Violin, Guitar, Recorder, Marimba, Choral Singing and Brass
• HIV / AIDS Peer Education
• Greening and Environment
• Youth Reading Role Models
• Creative Arts, Including, Pottery, Beading, Drama & Dance - Kwaito, Modern, Traditional and Ballet
• Sport including soccer, hockey, surfing, swimming, diving, cricket and the only Golf Driving Range in a township
• Computer Literacy
• Prison Outreach
• School holiday camps
These programmes place a focus on the creative side of the children’s brain, and supplements the shortcomings of the educational system in the townships. There are great inadequacies in the impoverished township schools in which we work, creating a great need for our programmes. Every year the Western Cape has an influx of up to 80,000 people from the rest of South Africa and Africa and this influx creates huge pressures on the Province’s already thin resources and infrastructure. Through our programmes, we allow the children to supplement what they learn during the course of the school day with creative programmes that let them express themselves and think freely in an imaginative environment. Providing these students with meaningful opportunities helps to grow the economy moving forward, as the next generation will be better equipped to deal with the challenges of tomorrow.
Amy Biehl was a gifted and dynamic young woman from Stanford University in the USA, committed to making a difference. After extensive work and service throughout the continent, which included working with the Namibian President on the Namibian Peace Treaty, she chose to dedicate her 1993 Fulbright Scholarship to the establishment of a multiracial democracy in South Africa. Amy worked tirelessly with members of the ANC at the UWC Community Law Centre, worked on the new Constitution, Women’s Rights as well as helped register voters for the country’s first free elections.
On August 25th, 1993, Amy Biehl’s life was tragically cut short in an act of political mob violence in the Guguletu Township outside of Cape Town. Four young men were convicted and sentenced to 18 years imprisonment for her murder. When the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established, the young men applied for amnesty. Determined to honour Amy’s love of South Africa and her belief in the truth and reconciliation process, Amy’s parents participated in the Commission’s hearings and supported amnesty for the youths; the four were granted amnesty and released from prison in 1998.
In 1997 the Amy Biehl Foundation in South Africa was born. Currently, two of the young men who were convicted of Amy’s murder and granted amnesty work for the Foundation to make the programmes a success. They are a living embodiment of values, such as forgiveness, reconciliation and tolerance, which we strive to teach the youth of Cape Town through our work.
Benefit to the children:
• Helping reduce the alarming rate of high school students dropping out of school;
• Giving children an alternative to a life of poverty, HIV Aids, gangs, crime & violence. By participating in our programmes, the youth are better equipped to ward off the temptations of drugs, gangs, violence and unsafe sex.
• Providing a beacon of hope for disadvantaged youths, and creating a future healthy society of emotionally equipped and well-rounded individuals.
• Enabling South African youth to reach their full potential, regardless of their current economic standing.
• Helping students develop life skills that will carry them forward as the future leaders and entrepreneurs of our society.
Amy Biehl Foundation Trust
7th Floor, No. 1, Plein Street, Cape Town, 8001
SOUTH AFRICA
Phone: (021) 462-5052 Fax: (021) 462-7325
e-mail: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
www.amybiehl.co.za
NPO No 026-922
Trust Reg No IT 8501/97
