Home from Home PLETT Projects in collaboration with Bitou Family Care received funding from StreetSmart Plettenberg Bay, towards social worker supervision.

In one of the Bitou Family Care cluster foster care homes in PLETT, lived a boy, who through hard work and determination did his Matric last year. He has had his share of problems in his short life and got involved with the wrong friends. However, through his faith, a very powerful understanding of what‘s right and wrong, and his strong sense of justice, he pulled through this difficult time in his life.

He has a very supportive house mother and she assisted and motivated him wherever she can. After finishing his final exams in November, he moved to Cape Town to start his internship at a big church, as his wish is to become a pastor.

Read more: You helped plant the seed

How wonderful and heart-warming to take a moment to focus on the impact of and reason behind all our StreetSmart fundraising efforts.

Though he is four years old, Mike is the size of a two-and-a-half-year-old, as his growth was stunted due to malnutrition. He is HIV+ and his health had been compromised as he hadn’t been consistently kept on anti-retroviral medication and taken to the clinic for check-ups. Mike’s mother had no interest in him and hadn’t visited him regularly over the years.

When she did eventually visit the sanctuary he’d been moved to, it was clear that she was only there to see if there was a handout. She had no real interest in him. More concerning was the change in Mike, who had opened up and became engaging, lively and chatty. Once he saw his mom, Mike became very anxious and withdrawn.

Read more: Mike successfully placed

Happiness is…another good news story, highlighting the reality that a child is never helped in isolation; the parents and siblings always become part of the outreach and the holistic solution in putting the child on the road to recovery.

Kidstop’s focus is to connect with the children and youth, through street outreach and the Drop-in Centre. At Kidstop the children find a safe environment where they can learn informally and get motivated to prepare for mainstream schooling. These children are placed into mainstream schools with great success.

StreetSmart George provided YFC Kidstop with funding towards a child and youth care worker salary. 

We held a Parenting Skills training workshop for those parents whose children were on the street and attending the Drop-in Centre. We had such a wonderful time of fellowship, encouragement, training, fun and amazing food as well. The eleven parents that attended the three days had benefited tremendously. They were given an assignment to implement what they had learnt and had to give feedback the following day. The parents then said that they understood how important it was to be a responsible parent. One parent said that the training came at the right time as she and her daughter were always fighting about everything. She said that she learned to communicate in a soft tone of voice and not to shout and that her daughter listened to her and she was able to listen to her daughter.

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StreetSmart South Africa supports World Homeless Day as it highlights the plight of millions of homeless people across the world. We encourage local communities to be part of the solution by giving responsibly.

Acting as a conduit fundraising organisation, StreetSmart partners with restaurants, accommodation establishments, wine tasting venues and online businesses, to receive donations from patrons.

StreetSmart ensures that every cent donated goes towards supporting locally run programmes that prevent the vulnerable from becoming street children and help those already on the streets through reintegration back into schools or their families, to achieve long-term interventions.

WHERE STREET CHILDREN ARE CONCERNED, IT IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU:

• Do NOT give them gifts or money – this only enables them to keep living on the streets
• Greet them in a friendly manner
• Rather give money to initiatives that addresses the challenges faced by street children, i.e. StreetSmart South Africa, which has a national network of collaborative partners.
  

  Read more: Be Part of the Solution - Give Responsibly on World Homeless Day with StreetSmart

We are grateful for the real long-lasting societal change that StreetSmart funding enables through our beneficiaries’ programmes.

TLC Outreach Projects received funding  from StreetSmart Cape Town, towards family reconstruction worker and field worker salaries, and related transport costs.

Debbie, aged 16, attends the T.L.C. Life Skills programme daily.  She comes from a home of addiction and too found herself doing drugs, sex for companionship, and making wrong choices of friends.

Her brothers are all on drugs and she has never attended school. Sadly this was not a priority in her family, as substance abuse got priority.
Her brother was murdered eight months ago, which just compounded the trauma she is experiencing in her life.

Debbie has been faithfully attending our classes since 2019, and she learning how to read and write.
We are so proud of her!

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Support StreetSmart and keep up social distancing while sampling gourmet food and premium wines from the Constantia region delivered straight to your door. Guests will be wined and dined in the first of three Cape Town virtual experiences hosted by SecretEATS on Thursday, 10 September. 

StreetSmart SA, which celebrates its 15th anniversary changing children’s lives R5 at a time, is the chosen beneficiary of SecretEATS. These exclusive dining experiences bring together food-lovers and chefs to have a unique, once-in-a-lifetime experience over the course of an evening.

Participants can expect a gourmet three-course spread with instructions via Zoom from 19h00 on how to master the art of plating each dish under the guidance of a Secret Chef. Each of the courses will be paired with a top tier wine from three boutique estates and guests will be one of the first to sample an exciting new release from the Constantia Wine Route.

Tickets for the virtual dining experience are R700.00 each which includes a donation to StreetSmart SA to assist during these trying times. To book please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. with the number of people in your party, your home address and any dietary requirements. Payment details will be sent on receipt of your booking email. Booking is essential as space is limited to forty guests.

Since its inception in 2005, StreetSmart SA has raised R11,6 million in aid of 31 organisations caring for street children and those at risk of living on the streets through partnerships with restaurants, accommodation establishments and wine tasting venues in the Western Cape, Garden Route and Gauteng.

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