Update
CALITZDORP NEWS - The Redstone Trust has increased its financial support for the Hope Options Centre in Calitzdorp, primarily for use in its Kidstop program.
Chantelle Sneygans, director of the centre, describes Kidstop as a pilot project.
"We have offered counselling services for seven years and have seen the need for more specialised services, support and skills development and have a partnership with the department of social development to reach adult victims of crime and violence in our community.
"In the process, we have identified the need for a specific program focused on the kids that beg on the streets of Calitzdorp who have not been in mainstream school for a year.
"We offer these kids an education and life skills program with a meal, care and support as an alternative to being on the streets.
"Where possible the child is enrolled back into a mainstream school with continued support, or they form part of the Jubilee Montessori Remedial Program we currently offer at Kidstop. We work both with the child and the family.
"We invest in them physically, socially, mentally and spiritually."
Chris Ball, the chairperson of the trustees of the Redstone Trust, said "This program has achieved positive results in its first year and it sends a powerful message to all of us.
"With the kind of unemployment we have in Kannaland, mixed with the increase in drug abuse, supportive programs have a knock-on effect and generate wider understanding.
"These children are victims of traumatic circumstances in their young lives that none of us would wish to have experienced, and over which they have had no control.
"We should embrace them and not spurn them, we should treat them with dignity and try to get them back on their feet and into the schooling system.
"It is tough to do, but they are part of us and Kidstop is showing the way."
The 2017 Redstone Mountain Bike and Trail Running Weekend held in May at Kruisrivier was a great success, with more participants and more support from sponsors.
It is the principal fund-raising event of the Redstone Trust, a registered non-profit organisation which raises money to benefit less fortunate individuals and organisations in the Kannaland district.
Read a previous article: Redstone Trust increases support
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