A day in the life of our Riziki social worker

What does a social worker actually do?

At Afri-Lift we have three social workers who face the day to day challenges of working with young people. They are the ones running programs, visiting families and dealing with all sorts of crises.

Let’s take Mathew for example.

Mathew 

He oversees the Riziki Child Assistance Program, that’s for our sponsored kids. It sounds simple, but it is far from it. What do you do with someone who is an orphan, has no family and is struggling at school? Where will he live? Who will keep an eye out for him? How do we assist him in his schoolwork?

There are no simple answers to a complicated situation.

There’s another child who will be married off if we can’t get her into boarding school. First we have to find a school that will accept her grades and then where will she go during the holidays?

One of our students is dyslexic but trying to find an affordable specialist is near impossible. Perhaps it could be helped through special lenses or one-on-one tuition, however he really needs a teacher aide to assist him. He’s in school from 7am until 5pm, when will he find time for tutoring?

One of the young people has found a job but doesn’t get paid till the end of the first month. Either he takes the 2 hours to walk to work, or we come up with another answer.

These are some of the regular challenges our social workers face and are expected to find the answer to. None are simple, all are complex.

Mathew on his way to visit a family

We are grateful for the staff that have vision, commitment and passion in their role. It would be too easy to become overwhelmed when working with the most disadvantaged youth, except that they know there is an answer.

Our Riziki team meet each Monday after another staff meeting to go through such problems but also to plan for the future. We try and work with the aspect of no limitations of people or money resources. We find a way to make things happen.

For example, most of our students struggle in maths and science. So we’ve instigated a once a month tutoring program, with slightly older young people helping out. We don’t have the funds to pay them or even rent a building. Between our team we’ve found a venue, volunteers and snacks to keep them going through their two-hour program. We are more than keen on finding a solution – we are committed.

Mathew with some of the children from the Riziki Program

That’s what I, as a relatively new staff member really appreciate about our team. Our resources are limited, but our workers in the field go above and beyond the call of duty because if we don’t, the future of these kids is limited.

To all of our team members, volunteers, interns and supporters we say a big thank you. We look forward to the day when you can come along and spend a day with our social workers and meet the incredible young people we have the privilege of working with.