Start making a difference to a student’s life today. It all adds up, and you can make a huge difference!
What did you do last weekend? And, more importantly, what did it cost you?
If you are part of a typical middle-income family, you probably spent between R200 and R400 on takeaways. Do this twice a week (which is what food delivery apps say most South Africans do) and that amounts to between R1 600 and R3 200 out-of-pocket every month for convenience’s sake – not because there isn’t food in your fridge.
But what if this month you channelled the money you normally spend on one or two of those takeaway sessions into something different … something that could make a dramatic difference to a young person’s life?
I’m talking about donating your takeaway money to a worthy cause like SAICA’s Thuthuka Bursary.
I know what you are thinking: ‘It costs over over R150 000 to fund a BCom CA-stream student’s varsity tuition every year; how will my R200 or R400 make any difference?’
The good news is that it will. Let me show you how:
The Thuthuka team and I have done a quick calculation using the average cost (based on the average cost for a Thuthuka recipient) for a student studying the CA-route who lives on campus, and we have discovered that it costs:
- R40 to feed a Thuthuka student one meal – that’s
- R120 per day to ensure a student gets breakfast, lunch and dinner
- R200 for a Thuthuka student to attend a day’s worth of lectures
- R300 for a Thuthuka student to sleep in residence every night
- R600 for just one of the 10 textbooks that a Thuthuka student needs every year
That goes to show that a small sacrifice from you can make a huge difference in the life of a student.
How do you get involved?
It’s simple, really. To make a once-off donation to Thuthuka, visit the Thuthuka’s pledge page on the SAICA website. Alternatively, if you are really passionate about helping a Thuthuka student fund his/her studies, why not consider setting up a more regular debit order: Thuthuka’s Business Development Manager, Mbali Mncwabe (MbaliM@saica.co.za), will be happy to send you banking details to help you do that. And remember, Thuthuka issues a Section 18A for every donation received, which means that you not only get to help a student, but you get to take advantage of the tax benefits too.
And while you are at it, if you’re a MySchool Card holder, please make Thuthuka a beneficiary on your card. That way Thuthuka will earn 0,5% of the value of your spend when you swipe your MySchool card at one of 1 600 nationwide partner stores such as Woolworths, Engen, Altech, Netstar, Waltons, Jacks Paint and many more.
It costs you nothing to make Thuthuka a beneficiary to your MySchool Card: you can do it by visiting www.myschool.co.za and updating the beneficiaries attached to your profile. (If you don’t have a card yet, you can sign up on the website or download the app to start earning Thuthuka funds today.)
So, what are you waiting for?
What is Thuthuka?
The objective of SAICA’s Thuthuka Bursary is to provide educational support to African and Coloured students in order to transform the demographics of the chartered accountancy profession to reflect those of the country in terms of race and gender.
Since launching 19 years ago, the Thuthuka Bursary has supported over 3 000 aspiring CAs(SA) through their university studies and created more than 1 500 qualified CAs(SA) – this is an amazing feat, considering that it takes a minimum of seven years to qualify. Taking on a new first-year cohort of roughly 300 students every year since its inception, the Thuthuka Bursary currently supports around 1 000 fully funded students at different levels of study ranging from first year to postgraduate level at universities around the country.
Author
Gugu Makhanya, Senior Executive: Transformational Projects at SAICA