About
Forest Town School was the first school for disabled children in South Africa established in 1948. Since then the services provided by this school and supported by Forest Town School Foundation Trust Fund, go far beyond of just being a school. At the end of this article are two individual success stories of beneficiaries of these programmes:
Forest Town School for Special Needs
Sunbeam Training Centre
Supplementary Services at Forest Town School
- FOREST TOWN SCHOOL FOR CHILDREN WITH SPECIAL NEEDS
Thousands of children with disabilities have benefited from this venerable and leading organisation in the field of disability in South Africa today. Without early multi-disciplinary support and intervention, it is unlikely that the majority of children with disabilities in South Africa today will be able to enter the economy.
EDUCATION
Approximately 350 children between the ages of 3 and 18 years are drawn from a 60km radius around greater Johannesburg (with most using the school’s fleet of 8 buses as they are unable to access public transport), with the majority coming from high density, low income areas, with most children not being on private medical aid schemes.
Adapted Mainstream Education: Our educational facilities provide children with milder disabilities with multi-disciplinary specialized support (medical, clinical, neuro-developmental therapy, social welfare services) while using the adapted mainstream curriculum which caters for their individual needs.
Modified Education: This holistic programme is for children with more severe disabilities and provides the same specialize multi-disciplinary support as above. Education focuses on developing their best potential while managing their disabilities. At the age of 14, these children enter the Imikhonto (Little Spears) – a skills development programme aimed at acheiving self-sustainability and independence.
The Skills and Work Experience Programme
This skills orientated programme gives teenagers between 16 and 18 years of age, the flexibility to develop their best potential according to the level of their skills. This includes providing accredited training while in school in the fields of catering, waitering, child care, hairdressing, beauty therapy (manicures, pedicures, massage), and ICDL training. A lot of focus is placed on entrepreneurial training especially for children who may not be able to access employment due to their inability to use public transport. We offer training in horticulture, upholstery, arts and crafts, car washing, jewellery making, soap making, and recycling. An occupational therapist and social worker provide support by sourcing employment and provide mentoring and monitoring support for both employee and employer. Learners continue to access the multi-disciplinary support offered to them at the school and continue to receive numeracy, literacy, life skills, basic accounting and other education while in this centre.
OPENING SOON: A commerical bakery, sponsored by Pretoria Portland Cement, will produce bread, cakes, pastries, etc. for sale to the children, staff, local community and outlets. As the majority of children at the school live in low income areas, the bread will be sold at a minimal cost to them. Income gained will provide sustainablity to this programme, which is aimed at providing bakery skills to eventually lead to employment in this field.
The Beauty Therapy Training Centre run by the above mentioned students is open to the public by appointment.
The Tsogo Arts and Crafts Coffee shop run by trainee students (with accreditation from University of Johannesburg) is also open to the public by appointment and on Friday mornings.
2. SUNBEAM TRAINING CENTRE
This centre, opened in response to appeals from the community, has provided professional training to those who care for the disabled in under-resourced centres, schools and homes throughout Gauteng. In 2008, this was extended to trainees at the Johannesburg College of Education and to Educators working in mainstream schools, which are experiencing a very high volume of children with barriers to learning. The majority of these children are affected by HIV/Aids, unidentified disabilities, not being school ready, family dysfunction and poverty. Because there is up to a 3 year waiting list at provincial hospitals for assessment and treatment by specialists in the field of disability, it is crucial that educators become the key to assist these children to receive their education adequately otherwise they will not continue with their education later on and therefore may not easily enter the economy.
Recently training extended to:
Limpopo Province
Kwa-Zulu Natal Province
Free State Province
In Gauteng, training has extended to community workers and the police force to empower them with knowledge to deal with vulnerable, disabled and abused children.
This Centre is entirely reliant on donor funds to operate as there is no Government grant.
- SUPPLEMENTARY MULTI-DISCIPLINARY SERVICES AT FOREST TOWN SCHOOL
Because the majority of learners have no access to transport, are not on private medical schemes or live in poverty, they find it extremely difficult to reach local services for primary and specialized medical services, rehabilitation therapy, social welfare services, Botox clinics, classroom caregivers (to assist children who are severely disabled and who need feeding, toileting, to take children to and from supplementary services) and transport. These services are essential for children with disabilities to reach their best potential, but they have to be provided during school hours. The school is reliant on donor funds to ensure that every child’s individual needs are met, including home visits and provision of specialized equipment for the hard of hearing, mobility (wheelchairs including electric, crutches, walkers, tricycles and prams), communication aids for non-verbal children and devices to assist with daily living.
Primary Medical Care
Children receive the services of a qualified full time nurse who attends to all the basic medical needs of a child, including vaccinations, flu injections, the provision of immune boosters, and visits to specialized clinics and hospitals. She also administers all medication required by children for their specific conditions i.e. epilepsy, etc. Special attention is provided for children suffering from HIV/Aids.
Specialized Medical Care
The services of professional specialists is provided free of charge. These include a Paediatrician, Orthopaedic Surgeon, Neurologist/Neurosurgeon, ENT, and Plastic Surgeon. Additionally, an Ophthalmologist and Dental Technician visit the school annually.
Rehabilitation Therapy
A team of professional Neuro-Developmentally trained therapists in the fields of Occupational, Speech and Physiotherapy assist children with a wide variety of services. This includes speech and language development, feeding techniques, the provision of devices (high and low technology) for non-verbal children, hearing devices (including Cochlear Implants), IT aids for children unable to use their hands (i.e. specialized keyboards, mice and head-pointers), the development of skills to carry out daily tasks and education, the development of mobility (i.e. getting a child to walk using a walker, etc.) and the provision of other specialized devices for mobility. All adaptations to adapt existing assistive devices is done at the school i.e. wheelchair inserts to save costs. The school also provides specialized splinting for children undergoing Botox therapy.
These departments are also the main resource hub in Gauteng for University of Witwatersrand students to carry out their practical training under trained therapists.
Currently these departments are dealing with a case load of 50 children per therapist. Donors are sought to employ three qualified therapists.
Social Welfare Services
This department is greatly needed as many of the children have hard lives. Family counselling, psychological assistance for children who have been abused, home visits, feeding scheme at the school and the provision of clothing and blankets for families in need is provided.
Botox Clinics for Children with Cerebral Palsy
This innovative treatment was pioneered at Forest Town School in 1996 and is now utilized world-wide. An expensive yet life-changing treatment, requires year long therapy and splinting. Except for the drooling clinic, the benefits are life-long. Donors are needed to support this very much needed programme. 
The clinics offered are:
The Botox Hand and Upper Arm Clinic
The Botox Lower Leg Clinic
The Botox Clinic for drooling in Cerebral Palsied children.
Caregivers
There is no policy in place by government to provide assistance to severely disabled children while in school, who are capable of receiving an education.
The school is in great need of caregivers as teachers have to leave classrooms when children need toileting or to be taken to supplementary services. This cuts down on teaching time and is an infringement on the rights of children with disabilities. At present the school only has one caregiver for two or three classes, but each class needs its own caregiver.
Transport
Currently, public transport is not geared for children with disabilities who need an escort, cannot access public transport due to the nature of their disabilities, and those who live in poverty. The majority of children come from single parent families who are either unemployed, or who are employed and thus unable to travel with their child from their homes to the school itself.
A fleet of 7 buses travels thousands of kilometres a month around greater Johannesburg twice per day. Some children do not live on the bus routes, therefore contract taxis have to be sourced to take them door to door.
This expensive operation requires financial support for children who cannot afford transport fees, and for petrol, servicing, insurance, tyres and running costs.
SUCCESS STORY OF PAST LEARNER OF
FOREST TOWN SCHOOL FOR CHILDREN WITH SPECIAL NEEDS
Sibusiso, aged 24 years, popped in to Forest Town School to thank the school for the very solid education he received, coupled with intensive therapy, medical and remedial services offered by the school that has enabled him to successfully enter the economy.
This handsome young man, who has Cerebral Palsy, says that without his special teachers, and especially his favourite teacher, Leigh-Ann Sims, he would not have managed to get further in his life.
Sibusiso received intensive speech, occupational and physiotherapy, as well a one-on-one remedial therapy. He said that he found it difficult to speak in his early years, but with speech therapy, he is now able to communicate easily. Sibusiso excelled at sport, and while at Forest Town School he was entered for the Junior Championships for the Physically Disabled, where he broke the cycling record.
Sibusiso is employed by First National Bank Processing Centre in Selby, Johannesburg, where he is 2nd in charge of “Pocket 2’s”, which services other FNB branches with back office work. FNB provided in-house training for Sibusiso. Sibusiso loves his job, commuting by Metro bus from his home in Berea. He commented that he is glad not to be wheelchair bound, because otherwise he would have great difficulty to access bus or taxi transport.
Sibusiso says: “I want to show disabled youth at Forest Town School that there is hope and a chance for employment. I want to be a good role model for the disabled. I am saddened that most disabled learners leaving school will find it difficult to find a job, so I am pleased that the Skills and Work Experience Training Centre runs a programme to teachaccredited and entrepreneurial skills to youth with disabilities.
Well done Sibusiso, you are truly a success story and a role model for disabled learners at Forest Town School. We are so very proud of your accomplishments and your determination to succeed.
SUCCESS STORY: SUNBEAM TRAINING CENTRE
THALITHA STIMULATION CENTRE FOR CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES IN EDEN PARK, EKHURULENI (Johannesburg)
One of the great joys of follow-up evaluation and support offered by the Sunbeam Training Centre at Forest Town School is witnessing the praise-worthy work of centre founders and caregivers. Following the six months of training, they have been able to make exciting, visible and profound difference to the lives of children with disabilities in their care.
The centre was started by a remarkable woman, Mrs Veronica Flemmer, in 2000, in response to the desperate need for such a care centre in this area. Veronica is resolute in working to improve the lives of children with disabilities, striving constantly to provide them with the best possible care, facilities and help at Talitha, and with their families. She and those who help her care for the children work voluntarily. She tries to pay the caregivers a stipend.
During the training programme they brought children from Talitha with particularly challenging difficulties to Forest Town School to be seen by therapists presenting aspects of the programme, to get advice, and be taught techniques to help the children, for example with feeding.
Veronica and Maria practiced what they had learnt and taught the other caregivers at their centre, and, whenever possible, the children’s parents.
When visiting Talitha it is beautiful and exciting to see the children looking so much healthier, and able to do so much more. Another way in which knowledge from training has been implemented, is the creation specific areas in the centre, for example areas for physiotherapy-type exercises, educational stimulation, a stimulation area for profoundly disabled children and a sick bay. Additonally, trainees learn about types of special equipment to help children with various disabilities, how to choose and use these for the benefit of each child, and how to make some pieces of equipment from waste.
In addition to her wonderful work at Talitha, Veronica continues to help those running other centres, is an active member of the regional Disability Forum, attended by, for example, social workers representing various government departments, and presents workshops relating to disability. Knowledge gained from training has empowered her to be more pro-active in fighting for the rights of the disabled in her area.
Regarding the Sunbeam Training Centre, Veronica spoke very positively about their decision to play a crucial role in empowering caregivers, community workers, educators and those who are involved with disabled and vulnerable children throughout Gauteng, and recently in Limpopo and the Free State.