Our story starts with the story of the Sandra Jones Centre (SJC). SJC was started as a home of safety for severely abused children in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe because, previously, there was no such facility in the country. The need was so great that it grew to over 80 children within a year and has continued to give life-saving support to over 2000 since then. They currently have 89 children in residence between the ages of newborn to 22. 

Caroline (Carol) Smith, a licensed special needs teacher, started home-schooling some of the primary school children in 2016 after noticing how behind in their education they were when they arrived at the centre. Even though all the children were placed in the local school, the children were floundering. Teachers couldn’t give them individual attention, with classes having upwards of 60 children per teacher. Every day, the children would attend school, but, in the chaos of so many in a class, they were often forgotten and neglected. In time, it was very apparent that the need was larger than what one teacher could support through home-schooling, leading Carol to open the Malibongwe School on the SJC property. Malibongwe is an N’debele word translating to “we give thanks.”

In the words of Carol herself, “I absolutely love my job and the children really become like my own. My greatest pleasure is to see a child feel safe and loved and then slowly their little personalities peek through and you can see the individual and the person they were meant to be. Within weeks children who have never held a book can read a story for themselves and the delight on their faces is just indescribable”.