What we do
Thuso Centre is a boarding school and care centre that provides basic academic, social and life skills classes to children with intellectual and multiple disabilities, enabling them to lead happy, healthy and productive lives. More of a community than a school, it is a place where children who are otherwise neglected, ridiculed or ostracised can live, learn, play and grow in a safe and loving environment.
There are regular classes and closely planned curricula, but class content is as likely to include basic life skills (like how to dress oneself) as well as Maths and Science. The teachers at Thuso Centre set individual goals for each student. These goals may range from teaching a teenage boy how to tie his shoes to teaching a young woman to take her first steps. Most of these teachers began working at the school years ago as volunteers before Sentebale, and later the Ministry of Education and Training, began providing money for their pay checks. It is an exhausting, frustrating, and often thankless job, but without the love and support that the staff at Thuso Centre provide, these children would have nothing.
Income Generating Projects
Poultry and piggery projects
Handcrafts, including jewelry, weaving and tie-dying.
Wood work, including trays and pot holders
“You are doing great work and are an inspiration to us all.”
What we've achieved
In 2015, the centre developed a five-year strategic plan for the first time.
Refurbishment of our buildings with the support of Sentebale.
Parent teacher meetings where student's goals and performances are discussed.
A new class for our students with autism.
Training workshops for teachers facilitated by the Children Disability Centre.
The construction of a new dormitory and sick bay.
A partnership with the Botha Bothe hospital and Baylor clinic for our students on medication.
Two formal graduation ceremonies.
Graduation at Thuso Centre: In 2011, the centre designed an exit strategy/graduation policy that was implemented in 2012, with the first graduating class of 13 students having acquired skills in different learning areas. Our graduation aims at giving recognition to our student's successes by awarding them certificates like any other school. Upon graduation, students are awarded funding for projects within their own communities to help empower them to survive future challenges and to be valued contributors within their own families.
Future Goals
To create a parent-caregiver training workshop to equip parents on how to appropriately support their child and follow up on training received at the centre.
To finalize the design of a formal and functional curriculum that is suitable for learners with intellectual and multiple disabilities.
Purchase a wheelchair accessible vehicle for outreach visits, family visits, hospital transportation and other school needs.
To establish an assessment facility for enhanced assessment, treatment and training for children with disabilities and parents in Lesotho
Begin our new Fellowship Program
Challenges Faced in Lesotho
Thuso Centre is not the only place in Lesotho for disabled boys and girls, but it is one of very few. There is also Phelisanong, near Pitseng in Leribe, and a handful of schools for the deaf and blind around Maseru. These centres are all wonderful places, but with small capacities they are not enough to provide the special attention needed for all of the children with disabilities in Lesotho.
The Lesotho Demographic Survey, conducted by the Bureau of Statistics, indicated that about 4.2 percent of the country’s population (about 79,800 people) have some form of disability, and it has been suggested that these numbers are low. Disabilities, particularly mental disabilities, are heavily stigmatised in Lesotho, which often leads to people with disabilities being hidden away in their homes and under-reported, particularly in rural areas.
Using World Health Organisation estimates for disability prevalence of seven to 10 percent of the population in a country like Lesotho, the population of disabled persons is estimated at between 155,000 and 220,000. The government of Lesotho’s Education Act says “a learner who is physically, mentally, or otherwise handicapped (will be) given the special treatment, education, and care required by his or her condition.”
Each semester, more and more parents arrive at Thuso Centre, desperate to enroll their children, but space is limited and each semester the staff is forced to turn too many away. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of children who are not receiving the special education and care that they need.
“May God give you the strength to continue supporting and teaching children with special needs.”