Refilwe means “gift” or “to give” in Tswana. Refilwe Community Center began in April 1991 when Jean Stewart and Yvonne Jaques started a clinic on a small site next to the Lanseria Airport, North of Johannesburg. From this grew a wider ministry to the needy people of the area that today focuses on addressing critical needs in the following areas; Medical, Child Care/ Education, life and specific skills training and income generating activities. Refilwe Community Center serves a severely disadvantaged community heavily affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic, limited education, unemployment, lack of skills and poor housing.
While on-site, ASTEP volunteer educators work directly with Refilwe's Orphaned & Vulnerable Children (OVC) involved in their 'God Parents Project' (as well as the surrounding local township children). This project is Refilwe's 'non-institutionalized' solution to caring for these at-risk youth sent to them by the government. The idea revolves around each child being a part of a family as opposed to one of 20 other children in an orphanage, shelter or refugee camp.
The second fascinating aspect of this program is Refilwe's partnership with Infinite Family, an American NPO that makes it possible for adults anywhere in the world to directly and regularly interact with a Refilwe OVC through regularly scheduled face-to-face video conversations and email; guiding the children and assisting with schoolwork, job training and life skills.
The ASTEP Experience at Refilwe provides basic dance, drama, music, poetry and playwriting workshops for the children of Refilwe during their holiday break (November through January). ASTEP volunteer educators are sent to Refilwe to provide support to the common goals of all three partners; using the arts as a catalyst to encourage the children to make the most of the technological offerings of Infinite Family, enliven their accountability to their community and use ASTEP curriculum to teach HIV/AIDS education and awareness.
Since 2005, ASTEP has been sending volunteers to work with children in Africa. In 2006, ASTEP established the first ever Art Section in a township school library affiliated with the Ubuntu Education Fund in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. ASTEP donated over 150 books, CDs and DVDs that covered a wide array of novels, plays, biographies, poetry, artwork catalogs, dance concerts and music recordings of South African artists and African-American artists. The impetus behind this project was to expose and provide the township children with inspirational material about people who are either from their area or who come from or grew up in similar backgrounds, families and/or situations. The aim was to motivate children, and inspire them by example, to pursue their creative abilities and wildest dreams.
In 2007, ASTEP, in collaboration with Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and the Ubuntu Education Fund shared a once-in-a-lifetime experience with children from our collaborative South Africa initiative. The ASTEP 2007 team of volunteer educators traveled with 47 children (hand selected by Ubuntu from townships in Port Elizabeth) on a 3-day bus tour to visit Johannesburg for an exciting arts-awareness trip. There the children attended a performance of The Lion King, an Athol Fugard play at the Market Theater, a rehearsal of RENT and the Apartheid Museum.
2007 was also the first year ASTEP exposed any of our students to the art of tap dancing; made possible by several tap shoe drives held by local dance studios and the donation of 100 pairs of tap shoes supplied by the Capezio Dance Factory Outlet in New Jersey. Also, two of our long term students received full scholarships to attend a local ballet academy during the following school year. ASTEP collaborated with the Yale Alumni Chorus on their Power of Song Tour for a wonderful benefit presentation in honor of the successes of the Ubuntu Education Fund.
In 2008 ASTEP partnered with two new organizations to further our reach and affect change in the lives of over 300 additional South African children. The first experience was in September with Global Camps Africa's Camp Sizanani. In November of that year, ASTEP sent four volunteer educators to Refilwe and provided, for the first time, an interactive, in person arts experience for those special children.
Over 42 million people are living with HIV/AIDS worldwide. Seventy-four percent of which, are individuals living in sub-Saharan Africa. In 2006 UNAIDS/WHO in collaboration with the Department of Health published that 5.5 million South Africans were living with HIV (around 11% of the total population). The ASSA predicts that by 2015 that number will exceed 6 million people, by which time around 5.4 million will have died of AIDS.
There are 14,000 new infections every day (95 percent in developing countries). HIV infections are alarmingly common amongst children in South Africa. The "disease of young people", half of the 5 million new infections each year occurring among people ages 15 to 24. According to UNAIDS, around 280,000 of these children who are living with HIV are younger than 15. AIDS has also had a devastating impact on Uganda. It has killed approximately one million people, and significantly reduced life expectancy. AIDS has depleted the country's labor force, reduced agricultural output and food security, and weakened educational and health services.
As well as many children being infected with HIV in South Africa, many more are suffering from the loss of their parents and family members from AIDS. The UN estimates that, currently, there are 14 million AIDS orphans and that by 2010 there will be 25 million. Once orphaned, these children are more likely to face poverty, poor health and a lack of access to education. One in six of these children will die from preventable causes before the age of five.
Only 57% of African children are enrolled in primary education of which one in three will not complete school. The number of girls not receiving an education in Africa is the highest in the world.
Africa is the continent worst affected by AIDS. In Africa prevention is made harder by poverty, lack of resources and weak infrastructure. Only around one in ten Africans has been tested for HIV and knows whether they are infected and misconceptions about transmission routes are widespread. As a result, most countries have yet to see any decline in their epidemics. However, a few notable exceptions prove that such declines are achievable.
