Play golf in Madison County, help kids go to school in Zimbabwe
JewelRide is offering local golfers a chance to play a round for a worthy cause.
JewelRide, which offers non-emergency medical transportation in the Illinois Metro East and the greater St. Louis region, is located at 2110 Troy Road in Edwardsville. The company is hosting the second annual JewelRide Golf Classic on Sunday, Aug. 11 at Belk Park Golf Course in Wood River.
Check-in and lunch begin at 12:30 p.m., with a shotgun start for the four-person scramble at 1:30 p.m. Dinner, awards and a silent auction will start at 6 p.m.
All proceeds from the tournament benefit T & R Philanthropies, a 501c3 non-profit organization started by JewelRide co-founder Tapiwa Mupereki and his wife Dr. Rutendo Faith Nkomo, to support access to education for disadvantaged youth in Zimbabwe.
“We want to create an afternoon of fun and networking in the community, but at the same time, we want to be a force for good,” said Mupereki, who expects up to 100 golfers to play in the tournament. “Golf is a sport that fosters patience, perseverance and connections. I grew up in Zimbabwe, a beautiful country in Southern Africa. The reality is that virtually all Zimbabwean parents understand and believe in the transformative power of education but because of extreme poverty, some kids don’t go to school at all.
“If those children don’t go to school, they’ll grow up and raise children who probably won’t go to school either. It’s a cycle that needs to be stopped. The level of intentionality required to stop that poverty cycle demands a culture of long-term collective effort.”
Mupereki noted that $250 will pay for one student for one year of an average school in Zimbabwe, including all tuition, uniforms, books and school supplies.
Donation levels for the JewelRide Classic, in addition to a single scholarship for $250, include a platinum scholarship for $5,000 (sponsors 20 students), a gold scholarship for $2,500 (sponsors 10 students), a silver scholarship for $1,500 (sponsors six students) and a bronze scholarship for $1,000 (sponsors four students).
“Unlike the U.S., there is not a public school system in Zimbabwe, so you have to pay for your schooling from day one,” Mupereki said. “If you don’t have the means to pay, you won’t be able to go to school.
“I grew up in that system where I started off at a rural school and I had to walk two or three miles each way to get to school. It wasn’t the greatest school, but at least I was able to get there and eventually I was able to go to college and try to get a better life. You can change someone’s life forever if you give them a chance to go to school, and in a mining town or a rural community or a farming community, $250 is enough to send a child to school for a year.”
Susan Young, meanwhile, is a board member for T & R Philanthropies, which was launched by Mupereki and Nkomo about a year and a half ago.
“I met Tapi about four years ago through his JewelRide company at a Chamber of Commerce event, and when they started T & R Philanthropies, they asked me to get involved,” said Young, who is a CPA in Edwardsville. “They’re trying to educate children in Zimbabwe, where you must pay for your education. If you don’t have the money, you can’t go to school.
“In the United States, we take it for granted that we have free public education, but it’s only $250 a year to educate a child in Zimbabwe and that provides everything they need. For $250, you can impact a person’s life, and that education can benefit their entire family.”
Support from the community and local business
Young noted that the JewelRide Classic is the primary public fundraiser for T & R Philanthropies, and any support from the community will be appreciated.
“People are welcome to make a gift of any size and that money will be used to provide a scholarship for a child in Zimbabwe,” Young said. “If you can’t participate in the golf tournament, you can still donate.”
The grand prize for the tournament is two round tickets to any destination in Canada, courtesy of Air Canada. Other prizes will be awarded.
Registration for the tournament is $150 for an individual or $500 for a four-person team. Skins and mulligans are available and included in the registration amount.
A long list of local sponsors is helping to make the tournament a success for JewelRide and T & R Philanthropies.
“We’ve had a great response from the business community, and they believe in our mission,” Mupereki said.
Sponsorships include hole sponsor ($150 for one hole or $250 for two signs and two holes), cart sponsor ($500), closet to the pin ($250), longest drive ($250), tent sponsor ($500) and gold dinner sponsor ($2,500). Silent auction donations are also being accepted.
Among the many local businesses supporting the tournament is Scott Credit Union, which is sponsoring the longest drive and closest to the pin awards. For Frank Padak, president and CEO of Scott Credit Union, it’s another way of giving back to the community.
“This is our first year of being a sponsor, but Tapi participated the last two years in our foundation golf outing, and he said had a foundation as well,” Padak said. “We met a few weeks later to talk about his organization and we saw his passion for helping children in Zimbabwe, knowing that’s where he came from, and that he’s a successful businessman here now.
“Education is critically important to our organization as well, so it was a no-brainer to get involved with their foundation. In addition to the money that we give them, their organization matches that money, which is outstanding.”
A golfing first
In addition to the fundraising aspect of the tournament, Mupereki is also using the event to introduce people to the game of golf. He brought together a group of five Zimbabweans (now living in the U.S.), including some who had never played golf before and organized lessons for them with a golf coach, and they will be playing in the JewelRide Classic.
“Golf has been presented as an elitist sport and some people feel they can’t play it. They feel permanently demarcated from it. There is a sense of a lack of equity, access and opportunity in the game of golf,” Mupereki said.
“At JewelRide, we focus on increasing access to health for all people. At T and R Philanthropies, increasing access to education is a huge priority for us. We certainly have an opportunity to increase access to golf in the communities we serve. People can learn to enjoy the game and the networking aspect of playing in a tournament, plus the idea of using golf as a fundraiser.”
One of the novice Zimbabwean golfers is Ken Takaidza, who has known Mupereki and his wife for more than 20 years since they attended college together in Zimbabwe before coming to the United States.
Takaidza has been in the U.S. since 2007 and earned a master’s degree in finance and economics from SIUE in 2008. He worked for a food processing company in St. Louis and started doing financial analysis and auditing for them, and most of his career since then has been in ethics and compliance.
This year, Takaidza started his own business, Caring Steward Home Care, in St. Peters, Missouri.
“I’m looking forward to the challenge to try something new, but I if have to embarrass myself on the golf course for a good cause, I’ll do it,” Takaidza said, laughing. “Tapi told me they have a charity golf tournament to raise money for school kids in rural Zimbabwe and I signed up. I had never played golf before, but (last Saturday) was probably my fourth day of practice and I hope to practice again before the tournament.
“I’m excited and the other team members are excited as well. Where we come from, golf is very expensive to play and there aren’t that many golf courses, so people don’t grow up thinking they can play.”
To register for the tournament or to become a sponsor, call 618-917-7372 or email classic@jewelride.com.
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Marion, Scott. “Play golf in Madison County, help kids go to school in Zimbabwe” The Intelligencer,
https://www.theintelligencer.com/news/article/jewelride-19622995.php. Accessed August 8th, 2024.
