STEM Infrastructure Support

In general schools in disadvantaged communities were never built with facilities that would engender the teaching and learning of science. Thus the construction of a Science TLC provides the teachers and learners with a creative space in which the teaching and learning of science and mathematics can be harnessed. 
​This construction of Science Teaching and Learning Centres project brings together partnerships with various corporate and other funders. Of the major contributors to the project have been the Garden Cities-Archway Foundation, Western Cape Education Department, Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID), INVESTEC, and the Transnet Foundation. The AK NPC Director, Prof Shaheed Hartley, designed the laboratory, setting out of the workstations and the general layout of the laboratory with full recognition of the necessary safety requirements and the needs of the science curriculum while construction experts oversees the conversion and construction of an existing classroom into a Science TLC.
As a rule AK NPC select schools based on the following criteria:
  1. The science educators’ active participation in the training courses provided AK NPC.
  2. Demonstrated commitment of science educators, principal and governing body to the advancement of science education at the school.
  3. Sustained interest in learner science activities such as involvement in science clubs and science competitions.
  4. Upward curve in learners’ achievement in science and mathematics
  5. The school, community and learner needs in terms of disadvantaged, race and rural-urban divide.
​The implementation of the Science TLC construction started in 2011 with the AK NPC Director, Prof Shaheed Hartley, designing a primary school Science TLC and constructing it in partnership with Garden Cities Archway Foundation at two rural schools, namely De Villiers Primary and Vergesig Primary both in Robertson. This was followed by secondary school Science TLC designs and a teacher training TLC design in the Eastern Cape. To date a total of 79 Science TLCs have been constructed in the Western Cape (74) and Eastern Cape (5). A further 13 Science TLCs are due for construction, namely 5 in Eastern Cape, 5 in Northern Cape and 3 in the Western Cape (see list below of completed Science TLCs and those due for construction). There are many schools who have already undergone and other who are preparing to participate in the training offered by AK NPC (see list below of schools qualifying for Science TLCs).