The drive by the University’s CEAD to empower pupils from the local primary schools continues to bear fruit. Commenting on the reading competition that took place at Umlazi Township’s Ngilosi Primary School on 20 March 2025, Saloshnee Pillay, English Subject Advisor, Umlazi District, said the standard of the competition had gotten higher.
The Director of the CEAD, Professor Busisiwe Nkonki-Mandleni, told the pupils that the directorate’s relationship with the community was governed by Goal 3 of the University’s Strategic Plan. Professor Nkonki-Mandleni said their guiding philosophy was that their relationship with communities should be reciprocal. “Our interaction with the community becomes part of the curriculum. We start with the pupils, so they learn good skills at a very early stage,” said Professor Nkonki-Mandleni. She said her directorate was aware of cases where individuals at a very high level could not write a report. Their efforts at empowering the pupils would reduce this and other problems in the education and work sectors.
The six primary schools that took part in the competition were Sukuma, Embonini, Umgijimi, Ngilosi, Emthethweni, and Marianridge. Dr David Ighodaro, said the adding of Marianridge primary from Pinetown was their attempt to expand their efforts beyond Umlazi Township. Dr Ighodaro also reiterated that the competition was meant to encourage a culture of reading among the primary schools. The CEAD and its partners, eThekwini Library and the Department of Education, regard the competition as a way of creating a solid foundation for the pupils to do well in their general education. For their part, the pupils read with confidence, expressing the required emotions as they went through their books. The overall winning school was Embonini Primary School, in both grades 4 and 5 categories, much to the joy of school Principal, Nomali Mpanza and her colleagues, Zanele Gumede and Busisiwe Zulu. Gumede, the English Teacher, said they worked hard with the pupils, an indication of how serious they take the reading competition. “We practised in morning before lessons start. I feel so happy. We won two huge roving trophies,” said Gumede. Gumede added that they would do their best in the competition at Marianridge in June.