Discovery Safe Journeys to School celebrates zero road fatalities since 2014 and rewards top scholar drivers

Discovery Safe Journeys to School (DSJTS) has delivered a decade of zero road fatalities in the Western Cape, an incredible milestone in road safety. At its annual awards ceremony at Athlone Civic Centre, the partnership between Discovery Fund and Afrika Tikkun honoured the province’s top drivers for 2025 and rewarded 75 scholar drivers across Gauteng and the Western Cape with quarterly and annual cash prizes ranging from R1,000 to R100,000, for their commitment to keeping children safe on the road. Denzil November, Anthony Abrahams, and Faizel Hendricks were recognised as the top three scholar drivers for 2025.

Andronica Mabuya, Head of Corporate Social Investment at Discovery says, “These awards are a highlight on the Discovery Fund calendar. We launched Discovery Safe Journeys to School, in response to the horrific accident at the Butskop level crossing in 2010, which took the lives of 10 scholars. Using telematics technology from Discovery Insure, the programme is directly aligned to Discovery’s aim of creating behaviour change for social good, by improving driving behaviour through training, monitoring, and incentives. That’s why we expanded the programme to Gauteng in 2024, bringing the total number of drivers to 879.”

Exceptional driver performance throughout the year

The programme monitors and evaluates driving behaviours such as accelerating, braking, cornering and speeding through the integration of telematics technology in vehicles, installed by Discovery Insure. Scholar drivers also complete free first-aid courses, health checks and defensive driving training.

To be in the running for quarterly and annual awards, each scholar driver in the DSJTS programme receives a score out of 750 and must have completed their training and compliance checks. The overall scores are calculated based on factors like driving behaviours, distance travelled and night-time driving.

Presenting some of the statistics at the awards event in Cape Town, Robert Attwell, CEO of Discovery Insure, said, “The top performing drivers in the DSJTS programme maintained exceptionally high driver performance scores throughout the year. Encouragingly, we’re also seeing the growth in the programme’s reach through the significant increase in the distances travelled and the number of trips recorded. The average number of trips recorded for each driver increased from 654 in 2024 to 1,306 in 2025, and collectively they drove more than 12 million kilometres in 2025 compared with more than 5 million kilometres in 2024.”

Attwell noted that data on acceleration, braking, and speeding incidents per 100 km among scholar drivers shows improvement since 2024. “With already low incident rates among scholar drivers, we’ve also seen further improvements, namely, lower accelerating events of 0.037, braking events of 0.25 and average speeding events at 0.79 for every 100 km driven. This indicates that safe driving behaviours promoted by DSJTS quickly become second nature. “It’s deeply inspiring to see the positive outcomes of the programme, and I thank every driver for their commitment to ensuring safer journeys for children across the Western Cape and Gauteng.

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Not just drivers, also educators

During the DSJTS awards held in Johannesburg, Gauteng on 15 November 2025, 30 scholar drivers received awards for the past three quarters in 2025. Attending this event, MEC for Education in the province, Mr Matome Chiloane, said programmes like these are immensely positive for road safety and he encouraged more partnerships in the province to expand the DSJTS programme. He also had an inspiring message for every driver, saying, “ou are not just drivers; you are also educators. You may not stand in front of a classroom, but with every cautious decision you make, every smooth braking maneuver, you are teaching our children that safety and respect for life matters. Your commitment sends a powerful message to thousands of young people – that you value their lives and their lives are precious.”

Along with the free first-aid and defensive driving training, the Discovery Safe Journeys to School programme also provides free health checks and eye tests, with glasses, if needed. In 2024, 79.5% of scholar drivers who had eye tests received free glasses following their eye tests, provided in partnership with Guud.

Mabuya says, “This programme is a compelling testament to the impact that strong partnerships and responsible corporate citizenship can bring to society.” At the awards event in Gauteng, Marc Lubner, CEO of Afrika Tikkun, also said the impact of every driver in the DSJTS programme is far greater than driving children to and from school. “You are key role models, and your attitude has the potential to positively influence the mind frame of every child.”

“We congratulate every scholar driver in the programme for your dedication. Every driver – about 25% of them women – is a true hero and a champion of safety. With its strong track record of improving road safety and community impact, Discovery sees DSJTS as a model for safer scholar transport nationwide, and we invite government bodies and private organisations to partner with us in expanding this scalable, proven approach to enable children’s rights to education and help bring down the still high child fatality rates on our roads,” says Mabuya.