Herzlia High School has a number of outreach programmes.
Interact Committee
This society is run by annually elected leaders, a strong pupil membership and has a teacher-in-charge. Interact activities include the following: fundraising for various disadvantaged organizations; organizing direct contact with community organizations through its outreach programme; working with various organizations eg Red Cross, The Big Walk by manning stalls and raising money. One of the recipients of funds raised is Solomon’s Haven, a home for sexually and physically abused, abandoned and neglected children.
Interact has two subsidiaries run by committee portfolio heads elected from within Interact.
The Tutor Outreach Programme (TOP)
Once a week, the Grade 8 learners from Thandokulu Secondary School are transported to Herzlia High School. High School learners tutor the visiting learners in English, Mathematics and Life Orientation. All lessons are planned by the Herzlia pupils and are designed to give extra learning opportunities. During the nutritious lunch break, learners from both schools spend time together. TOP is run solely on donations, that pay for transport, clerical requirements and a much-needed lunch.
Feedback
Herzlia High School has been involved in Feedback for a number of years. Each week classes are asked to bring bread and peanut butter to make sandwiches for children in underprivileged schools. The Feedback Organisation collects the sandwiches and delivers them to these schools.
Other outreach programmes run by High School pupils include:
The Environmental Association (TEA)
The TEA committee has raised funds to assist the organization, Abalimi Bezekhaya, by planting a vegetable garden for an impoverished school in Khayelitsha. This will provide much needed nutrition for the pupils and teach them about organic farming. TEA has retained contact with Abalimi and with other gardening organizations for impoverished communities such as Soil for Life. Their ongoing work aims to develop an awareness in their peers of the environmental challenges which face us all.
Treatment Action Campaign (TAC)
The TAC has strong links to its parent organization. The aim of TAC is to deal with issues which relate to HIV/AIDS by creating awareness within the school, generating a positive attitude towards HIV/AIDS in the school and encouraging the youth to become proactive and resolute in tackling the problem of HIV/AIDS. Their projects have included the invitation of guest speakers such as Zachie Achmat and Brett Anderson; participation in the TAC pre-demonstration ceremony in town; the raising of money for an AIDS orphanage during the AIDS Awareness Week; the raising of money and collection of clothes and toiletries for Nazareth House as well as visits to the children there.
United Africa Society (UAS)
The aim of this society is to aid current crisis zones in Africa; to promote a proudly African mentality and to unite Africa’s countries and her people. The first project is to raise awareness of Darfur by raising funds; opening branches at five other schools; manning a stand at the Holocaust Centre’s ‘Witnessing Darfur Multimedia Expo’; going to various schools and showing a presentation during their assemblies; publicizing their cause in the Cape Argus and appearing on Cape Talk, SAFM and Bush Radio; visiting Rondebosch Boys High School, showing their slide show and having a guest speaker who spoke on the situation in Darfur. Funds which have been raised will be sent to Darfur through UNICEF.
The cultural committee
The aim of this committee is to give pupils an opportunity to perform either through music, drama or dance. In addition, members will visit various galleries and museums throughout the Peninsula. The first project was an Inter-Schools Battle of the Bands competition – to promote cultural awareness through schools in Cape Town and provide the means for some of South Africa’s young, undiscovered musical talent to perform and gain recognition. The event, attended by some 600 pupils, was judged by a panel of highly experienced judges from the music industry. The money raised at this event was earmarked for Solomon’s Haven, in Mitchell’s Plain - a home for sexually and physically abused, abandoned and neglected children.
Pupils Educating the Nation (PEN)
This is a student unity and community outreach programme. Herzlia High School’s Student Representative Council has taken the initiative and approached four other schools in Cape Town to help make a positive change in some areas of the South African educational system. Along with representative members from Westerford High School, Jan van Riebeeck High School, Reddam College Tokai and the Deutsche Schule Kapstadt, the PEN executive committee aims to build relationships between these five top schools and, through extensive fundraising and community action, help to alleviate issues of ineffective education and poverty within Cape Town.
This committee concentrates its attention on the plight of the Jewish community in Cape Town. The Matzo Drive and the Rosh Hashana Appeal are just two of their major projects. Throughout the school year they raise awareness of the needs of those less fortunate and aim to assist in every way possible.