When Jabu Mteku and Jill Sachs were invited to attend a prestigious ECD Service Excellence Awards  function held at the Golden Horse Casino Hotel on the 18^th of February, little did they know that they were at the top of the list of those to receive recognition for their special diligent roles.    Their contributions towards establishing the ECD programmes from the mid 1990’s up  until 2006 were recognised in the form of gifts, trophies and certificates of excellence.  As Deputy Chief Education Specialists at that time, Jabu was awarded a certificate for her contribution, and Jill was honored for being Pioneer in phasing in ECD.    Their work involved many long journeys to the most rural KwaZulu districts.   We take pride in their wholehearted efforts that went into the laying the foundations for the phasing in of the reception year, so critical in harnessing young minds of greatness.Now, as a result of their pioneering work, the department boasts 5 500 grade R classes, with more than a 100 000 pupils accessing these facilities within the KwaZulu Natal communities. Jill’s deep-rooted dedication continues into her retirement from the department, seeing her designing the fully accredited Caversham eYe programmes, a flourishing initiative.  Last year Jill, with the assistance of Jabu, ran a course for the Lidgetton pre-school and Foundation phase teaching fraternity, where she looked at growing facilitation skills and focused on the Arts as a tool for teaching numeracy/ literacy skills, as well as  being carriers of psycho-social and cultural residues in the earliest developmental stages of the young ones.    We congratulate Jill and Jabu on receiving the recognition due to them! Witty Nyide