US student to climb Devil’s Peak and Lion’s Head to raise money for bicycles for pupils in rural villages

An American student will climb Devil’s Peak and Lion’s Head in Cape Town to raise funds for children who walk long distances in the Northern Cape.

Joseph Payne‚ a student at Mercer University‚ in Georgia‚ started his work as an intern with the DOCKDA Rural Development Agency towards the end of May. Payne‚ who is studying philosophy‚ politics and economics at Mercer University‚ has been moved by the struggles of the people living in the rural villages in the Northern Cape.

After being taken on as an intern by DOCKDA‚ Payne was invited to go to the Northern Cape where he could see the projects that the organisation was involved in. DOCKDA Rural Development Agency is a non-profit organisation working in partnership with home-based care organisations in the deep rural areas of the Northern Cape.

In the first week of June 2017‚ he visited some of the projects and witnessed the organisation distributing bicycles to children in rural communities.

“While we were driving around to get to different villages in the province‚ I saw that a lot of children were walking long distances to get to school. That shocked me as it was a clear need in the area…It is something that really struck me because I’m not used to this. In the States‚ transportation to school is normally taken care of by school buses. So this was a problem that I had never had to deal with‚” said Payne.

According to the 2013 National Household Travel Survey‚ pupils in all geographic locations were more likely to walk all the way to their educational institutions than use any of the other modes of travel.

Of the 17.4 million learners that attended educational institutions‚ more than half (about 11 million) walked all the way. The survey further showed that rural pupils were more likely than metropolitan or urban pupils to walk more than 60 minutes to school.

Payne wants so use his adventure to raise money for the bicycles and address this problem. On July 22 he will climb Devil’s Peak and Lion’s Head to raise funds and buy bicycles for children in rural Northern Cape. He will be joined by a fellow American from Mercer University.

He also plans to take footage and pictures during the climb in order to share it with the donors on Facebook as he goes up the mountains.

His target is to buy five bicycles which will cost him R18‚ 600. “The bicycles that DOCKDA buys are really of high quality. They are designed to be ridden on rough surface and can support heavy loads‚” he said.

Raising the funds will be his last act of goodwill in the country as he is scheduled to leave the country on July 26.