Tembisa pupils bake their way to the top

A public and private sector partnership is developing the baking skills of Tembisa pupils.

Pupils from Masisebenze High School in Tembisa Gauteng are being taught how to make confectionery treats, thanks to a partnership with Chipkins Puratos Bakery School SA.

Twenty-five pupils are participating in the four-step training programme that will teach them how to bake cakes, bread, biscuits and scones, among other things.

Administrator of the Chipkins Puratos Bakery School SA Jeanette Letsoalo said the training aims to skill the pupils in baking and developing an entrepreneurial form of thinking.

Letsoalo said: “What we are trying to achieve is to take learners from under-privileged backgrounds and turn them in to entrepreneurs of the future and get them into the baking industry.”

Pupil Thabiso Ndlovu said the skills he is learning will allow him to one day open his own bakery.

The programme has seen the building of a bakery in the school yard which allows pupils to attend lessons after class.

Students who pass will receive an NQF level 2 qualification in bread and flour confectionary, on top of their matric certificate. The programme is run over a two-year period, starting with Grade 11 pupils.

Pupil Yolanda Genda has already started applying the skills she is learning from the school by baking treats for her family.

The Grade 11 pupil said her family saves a lot of money as they no longer have to go to the grocery store as often. “I bake all sorts of nice things for them at home.”

She said that she has already learnt how to bake different things. “I have learnt how to bake muffins. I have also learnt that in order to make it in this industry, you need a lot of patience,” she said.

Spokesperson for the bakery school in South Africa Richard Kuppan said they hope that the lessons learnt from the programme will assist in developing skilled confectioners.

“Bakers are the fourth scarcest skill in in the wholesale and retail sector today,” he said.