Antelope Park
The leading private game reserve in Zimbabwe and home to ALERT
ALERT Antelope Park
Nestled in the heart of the Zimbabwean Highveld is Antelope Park, residing eight kilometres south-west of Gweru- the third-largest city in Zimbabwe. This stunning example of open Zimbabwean bushveld was the winner of the World Travel Award for Zimbabwe’s number one private game reserve in 2018, 2017 and 2016. It is also the home of ALERT and many of our various projects, which include the lion rehabilitation and release programme and numerous community projects.Â
Lion conservation
Antelope Park is the birthplace of ALERT and is home to the ALERT rehabilitation and release into the wild project and the Ngamo pride, this pride contains 9 lions. 4 of which have passed through the first stage of the project and are now currently in the second phase, the remaining lions are lions that were born into the second phase of the programme and have no human contact whatsoever.
Community & Cultural Exchange Projects
ALERT Education Centre
The ALERT Education Centre (AEC) opened in December 2012 and is one of the first conservation programmes of its kind in Zimbabwe, pursuing to ignite the desire to conserve our wildlife in local school children in and around Gweru city. Lessons in conservation education are free and provide lessons for children in Grades 6 and 7 (11-12 years old).
6 innovative and interactive modules make up the syllabus for the education centre
- Conservation:Â This is the bedrock for our remaining modules. With the conservation module, the children start to recognize the importance of conservation and build greater knowledge and understanding of the need to conserve. The conservation module covers the necessity for conservation, as well as both direct and indirect impacts.
- African animals: The African animal’s module aims to broaden the children’s knowledge and understanding of a wide range of African animals, how they have adapted and how to conserve them. It provides the basics of animal classifications, biology and adaptations.
- African habitats: The African habitats module teaches children about the different habitats that are dispersed over Africa, the different ecosystems and the importance of conservation in the modern world.
- African countries: The African countries module aims to further the knowledge and understanding of the children’s continent, a basic understanding of geography, demographics, culture and diversity in the African continent.
- African cats: The African cat’s module focuses on Africa’s big cats, providing a base to learn about their biology, conservation efforts to save the species and the value of such species to Africa.
- Tracks and signs: The tracks and signs module engages the class with their surrounding environment, furthering their understanding of natural habitats and wildlife. The children learn basic skills in tracking and they analyse a variety of African animals spoor and learn to recognize different flora.
Mickey Mouse Preschool
Mickey Mouse Preschool provides childhood development for approximately 270 children. The ages range from 3 to 6 years old. They prepare the children for their first year at school.
Volunteers help teachers and staff with extra hands for classroom activities, as well as break time activities. They also assist with cooking and washing up, for the children who are provided with a nutritious meal.
Mkoba 4 Primary School
The Government-run Mkoba 4 Primary School provides education for approximately 2200 students with an average class size of 55 students to one teacher, and around 300 students in each age grade. Due to the high number of students, there is a critical shortage of classrooms and resources such as textbooks and teaching aids.
The Government-run Mkoba 4 Primary School gives training to roughly 2200 children with a normal class size of 55 children to one teacher, and there are around 300 children in each age grade.
To deal with a large number of students, the school authorities introduced “hot seating” where each student attends a morning or afternoon class, which has negative impacts on student/teacher interaction. The school is in desperate need for additional classrooms and resources.
With help from volunteers, ALERT provides both manpower and material support to this school. Volunteers provide assistance to the teaching staff by giving pupils in the special needs class more individual attention during lessons, assisting with students’ work and producing teaching aids. Material support is given through maintenance and facility upgrades and the provision of teaching resources such as computers, reading and writing materials, as well as sports equipment.
Julena Primary School
Julena Primary School in a rural area, approximately 20km from Antelope Park. The original school building is an old farmhouse that was built in the 1940s. The walls are severely cracked, and the ceilings and walls are breaking down. There are only a couple of windows that are still intact and no electricity. There have even been sightings of black mamba snakes in this building.
There are 200 students that attend Julena, who are being taught in this dilapidated farmhouse. Most of these students have to walk up to 12 kilometres each way, each weekday to attend classes.
A new school building consisting of 2 classrooms has been built, however, this is not enough to accommodate all the students. Therefore, we are still building more classrooms with the aim of having all the students safely out of the derelict farmhouse. We assist a 75-year-old builder and other locals from the community who are building the school by making bricks, putting up walls and roofing.
Our volunteers also provide assistance to the teachers by assisting the kids in Maths and English. They work in smaller groups and this allows for more individual interaction and attention for the kids.
Community Healthcare Projects
Mkoba Polyclinic & Mtapa Polyclinic
The ALERT healthcare programmes collaborate with 2 Gweru city-run clinics which are understaffed and poorly resourced. Antelope Park volunteers are an invaluable source of both manpower and material support to the clinics. The volunteers provide assistance to the qualified clinic staff in many of the simple tasks and observations, allowing the clinic staff to focus on frontline healthcare matters.
Services provided at each of the clinics include HIV/TB clinic, immunization clinic, family planning, home visits, maternity care – pre-& post-natal.
Mkoba Polyclinic: provides healthcare services for an area of approximately > 50,000Â expected births per year: 19000 (average 160 per month).
Mtapa polyclinic: provides healthcare services for an area of approximately 26.700 > expected births per year: 1070 (average 90 per month)
