TAVISTOCK College announced last week that it has entered into a Schools Partnership Programme with a charity based in Swaziland, Africa.

A group of nine students have applied to be ambassadors for charity SKRUM and the school.

SKRUM has coached and educated children at local schools and communities in Swaziland. It introduces children to sport, and, in partnership with the relevant government bodies, also takes the opportunity to educate the children in HIV/AIDS and gender and health awareness.

A large part of the role for the students is to lead a group to raise money to enable the college representatives to fulfil its pledge to fundraise £3,000 to take to Swaziland during July 2018.

The money will pay for three water harvesting systems for three schools in Swaziland, as well as purchase over 50 fruit trees to plant in two communities so that the people of that community can eat the fruit for years to come.

As ambassadors the students will build these water harvesting systems and plant these trees, over a five day period in the deprived communities of Swaziland. They will also be raising awareness through HIV and AIDs education.

A spokesperson for the school said: ‘As well as the financial pledge, we have pledged to take a substantial amount of playing and training equipment and kit to allow us to leave a legacy to the schools and communities that we visit, to allow them to continue to train and develop in the sport that we all love.

‘To enable us to fulfil both arms of our pledge we are inviting two rugby clubs in Devon to come on board as active partners in the programme. The role of the rugby clubs that become partners is fundamentally to provide us with old playing and training kit and equipment for us to take to Swaziland as well as provide us the opportunity to hold some fundraising at or around the rugby clubs to enable us to maximise the opportunity to fundraise.’