Hirsch’s & Akani Primary School
One of Margaret Hirsch’s projects for 2013 is to take the Girls With Dignity Projects to underprivileged school girls throughout South Africa. Margaret
BWSA’s Business Woman Of The Year (Entrepreneur) took on this project when she learnt that post pubescent girls in underprivileged areas around the country (and throughout Africa) were not attending school for a week every month when they had their periods. “These girls are missing out on three months of their education every year. I realised that it was something that had to be dealt with as a matter of urgency.”
Sue Barnes, who developed the “Girls with dignity” pad pack has a background in clothing construction, fabrication and quality control. Commenting on how the pad and panty set evolved she explained “I spent a while coming up with different ideas before my final product evolved. It is a normal panty that has poppers on it, and the sanitary pad clips onto the panty. This is very user friendly as the pad clips on and off easily. The panty is made of 100% cotton knit, (130 – 140g) which allows the skin to breath. The elastic has a standard non-woven rubber base, and wont stretch out of shape. The pad has 6 layers, the outer being the 100% cotton knit, water proofing, 3 layers of hydrophilic fabric and then the inner is a hydrophobic fabric. It is fully washable and therefore reusable and will last as long as a pair of panties.
On Monday, 5 August, the PRO’S from Hirschs – Lesley-Ann Oates (Fourways), Bridgitte Thysse (Boksburg), and Jenny-Lee Gordon(Strubens Valley) joined Margaret Hirsch at Akani School in Diepsloot to bring this fantastic initiative to these wonderful young ladies. They were extremely honoured a to have such a role-model and influencial figure come and speak to them. Margaret spoke to them about her childhood and how she had encountered many a difficult times, but with perseverance, determination and hard-work, she achieved all her goals and dreams. She encouraged the young ladies to always give their very best and to never give up, no matter what the circumstance.
Mamre Primary
Today we visited Mamre Primary School to launch the 2nd Dignity Programme in Cape Town. Write Up & Pictures Attached.
The article is being sent to the Local Newspaper so I also included the information with reference to the make up of the product & our achievements thus far.
Hirsch’s inspires young girls at Mamre Primary School
Margaret Hirsch, BWSA’s Business Women of the Year (Entrepeneur) visited the Mamre Primary School to support the young girls by launching the Restoring Dignity Programme. The Restoring Dignity programme sets out to provide young girls with resources to restore dignity to their daily lives by providing them with re – usable, eco friendly sanitary towels. The panty is made of a 100 cotton knit and the sanitary towels is made using 100 per cent cotton with an outer hydrophobic layer and inner hydrophilic absorbent layer which is breathable and easy to clean. Situated approximately 50 Kilometres outside Cape Town, Mamre Primary School serves hundreds of students from Grade R to Grade 9. Mamre Primary School is the second in the Western Cape that the Hirsch’s Foundation has adopted with the Restoring Dignity Programme with the first school being AZ Bermann High School Mitchells Plain situated in the South Metropole of Cape Town. “These girls are missing out on three months of their education every year. I realised that it was something that had to be dealt with as a matter of urgency.” said Margaret Hirsch. A year since hearing that shocking fact Hirsch’s Foundation has supported 20 Schools with the Restoring Dignity Project nationally. “It’s Possible” said Margaret when speaking to the Young Girls. The talk inspired the young girls to be actively involved in their future by making the right decisions, valuing themselves and realising their worth. Within the next month Hirsch’s Foundation will kick off the Essay Competition with young girls to reflect on their future and dreams. All the young girls were invited to submit an Essay of 500 – 1000 words of their Life Journey.
Competition winners will receive a prize which will support their School Education financially. “Thank you coming all the way to Mamre Primary chool – it shows that our school is not forgotten even though we are so far away from everything” said Educator Rochelle Apolles
Maputha Secondary School
This morning myself, Sharon, Jade, Maria and Mrs Hirsch went to the Maputha Secondary School in Thembisa. The Maputha Secondary School was carefully selected out of all the under privileged schools in the area and was chosen to be included in the Girls with Dignity Programme
Margaret Hirsch took the Girls with Dignity Programme that started off as a BWSA (Business Woman of the Year) initiative and has now continued with this fantastic programme in a personal capacity. Margaret realised that many girls in the poverty stricken areas were not attending school during their Menstrual Cycle due to a lack of sanitary pads and how the lack of school attendance affected their grades, ultimately resulting in many young girls not completing their Matric. This drove Margaret to find a practical, long-term solution to help and accommodate young girls today, keeping in mind all the challenges faced in our poverty stricken areas. Each girl in Gr8 & Gr9 was very pleased to receive a “pant pack”, this consists of a panty and three re-usable pads. These panty packs were specifically designed to last 5 years. Furthermore Margaret spend time with the girls motivating them to not be defined by their current financial circumstances and gave them guidelines and tools on how to break free from their circumstances and how to reach their dreams and goals.
“Be the author of your own life story, don’t allow some-one else to write it for you” This is the message sent to the students when Margaret told them of the Essay competition. This is a competition that’s open for the entire school to enter with great prizes (R2000.00 for the 1st prize, R1000.00 for the 2nd price and R500 for the 3rd price). The rules for the competition are fairly simple.
The essay needs to start where the student writes a letter as his/her 90 year old self, looking back at his/her life. The writer must tell the reader about all the goals posts in the writers life that was achieved, this includes the career choices made, the person he/she married, the number of children they had etc. This is a very smart way to force children to think about their life and what they want to accomplish, as far too many children leave school these days with no plan or goals for their lives
The children were visibly grateful for the panty packs and every girl stood in line to receive it. I was astonished to see the atmosphere change as Margaret continued with her motivational talks resulting in a various loud applauses, children screaming out “thank you’s” and looks of admiration.
I am specifically grateful for being a part of this great project as it was truly an eye opener to the small things that we take for granted and knowing that today I was a part of something big, today we probably changed someone’s life in a way that they will never be able to say thank you.
