Johannesburg, 30 April 2019 – Dr Rufaro Nyamuda has been announced as the successful applicant of the Volkswagen Touareg Sabbatical – an initiative that asked South Africans to share their ideas of how they would put the luxury of time to good use, with a sabbatical dedicated to making a difference.
An impressive 1 380 plans were submitted by fans of the brand – but only one of these applicants were promised the opportunity to turn their idea into a reality.
The competition winners business idea was reviewed by a panel of industry experts, including Volkswagen’s Marketing and Communications Manager Meredith Kelly and Ogilvy’s Creative Director Mike Martin, and deemed to have the potential to be “extraordinarily impactful to communities”.
Dr Nyamuda’s vision – to devise a comprehensive and robust healthcare management and educational platform, which promotes the optimal medical support of children from Grade 0 to Grade 12 – resonated with panellists as a worthy contender for funding.
Speaking about Dr Nyamuda’s entry, Volkswagen’s Head of Communications, Andile Dlamini, said: “The standard of the ideas submitted to our Volkswagen Touareg Sabbatical campaign has been exceptional. The variety of ideas that we received made it a very difficult task to select one recipient to receive funding. However, Nyamuda’s plan has the potential to make a significant social impact, and that is what we were hoping for when we began this journey.”
As part of this major national campaign, the public were incentivised with a paid-for three month sabbatical and invited to send in ideas that could make a valuable contribution to the country, but that may have been put on the backburner due to time and money constraints.
Dr Nyamuda commented: “There is an urgent need for change in the way we manage schools’ healthcare policies, which are well overdue for an upgrade and digital transformation. My solution is to create CEBISA (meaning ‘one who gives advice’ in Xhosa), which is a modern-day healthcare tool. CEBISA is intelligently designed as a ‘digital school nurse’ and promotes a healthy school environment by providing easily accessible resources to improve preventative care, manage chronic conditions and provide basic primary healthcare services. It allows parents and guardians, as well as school staff and students, access to a structured e-learning portal.”
“To be able to turn my dream into a reality is a tremendous opportunity – one that would not be possible without the support of the Volkswagen Touareg Sabbatical campaign. To be recognised as someone who can make a real difference to society is a huge accolade of which I am very proud,” added Dr Nyamuda.
Editors Note: Tourism Tattler congratulates Dr Nyamuda on winning this innovative sabbatical opportunity from Volkswagen. Our own social impact initiative, Walk4Africa was submitted and made it through to the second round of submissions. Well, there could only be one winner, and perhaps Volkswagen will run the Touareg Sabbatical campaign again next year, and by then Walk4Africa.org and our Pick-It-Up waste recycling and education app will have taken a step closer to becoming a reality.
