My Argument
In Favor of Working Together
For the better part of two decades, I have found myself forever preoccupied with how humans create vibrant communities of engaged citizens who know how to make positive change actually happen. Through years of administrative and project management experience, over a decade of multimedia content production work, and consistent learning and teaching in complex problem-spaces over that time, I have discovered a broad range of strategies and tactics; adapting always to what works and what doesn't in many different contexts. My favoured approach is always to seek community-informed-and-driven solutions.
Healthy democracy requires an engaged citizenry actively choosing to keep it alive with every election and by-election. If democracy teaches us anything, it is that people make decisions based on what they believe, not necessarily what they know. It is exactly at this intersection, that of belief and knowledge, where good education makes all the difference.
My lived experience has taught me what it feels like when the entire system seems set up to either exploit you, ensnare you or end you, when you and your friends sit there wondering "what can we do?" and every attempt seems to fall apart. My life changed when I found people who modelled the agency that had always been available to me but that I had no awareness of. This journey from powerlessness to capability is at the heart of my approach to empowerment and education. For anyone to build prosperity for themselves or others, they need first to believe that such steps are possible, and have a sense of what tools and paths are available to them.
Success, to me, is establishing measurable, practical means by which hope and agency can be demonstrably restored to youth facing a far more daunting future than I was at their age. I hope to be a part of building networks of interconnected communities, empowering them with both the belief that they can make life better, and making space for them to practice actual skills and acquire the knowledge needed to realize that belief.
In my view education is most effective when focused on developing practical knowledge of exactly how one can affect one's community in measurable, tangible ways. To illustrate, let me use the example of one of my favorite, undervalued fields: Civic Education. How do we learn the processes for legally adding extensions to a house? Who teaches us how organizing action in local government can be more effective, because that is where your voice is most loudly heard? Who teaches anyone how to get the courts to act on the public's behalf? When people understand how government actually works, they become less preoccupied with who's in power and more interested in what policies will shape their lives.
People choose according to what they believe, not what they know. This is why my teaching approach is focused on building well-grounded intuitions about how the world actually works and modelling the practices involved in navigating that world. Most people learn by choosing from available models and I believe that institutional leadership's role is to provide consistent, stable models that can serve as benchmarks for the public. It is a core function of a healthy institution to demonstrate that work toward a better future happens and is ongoing.
I bring operational capability to this challenge. My administrative experience includes two years as an assistant to a Sectional Title administrator, where I compiled and drafted reports for high court submissions. This work required precise communication, sound legal understanding, and communicating effectively in complex stakeholder relationships. My work as a multimedia content producer has given me a lot of project management experience as a solo creator and as part of a team. My background as a content producer, spanning stage, screen, audio, written, and interactive media production, has equipped me with sophisticated understanding of how attention can be directed toward learning, how emotion affects memory, and how interactivity can lock concepts in the mind. My time as Head of Media for The Learning Organisation was the catalyst for my fascination with how to improve the quality of education and outcomes in South Africa.
The common thread throughout my background has been almost constant learning and teaching in complex problem-spaces with diverse stakeholders and teams. I have often worked with assistants and volunteers that need to be taught on-the-job, as well as teaching in more structured, classroom scenarios. I favour community-informed, grassroots-driven solutions and modular, adaptable curricula. I am forever on the search of opportunities to deliver education based on honest assessments of what actually builds engaged citizens capable of full participation in community and civic life.
Thank you for your reading. This is obvs a cover letter for my resume.
If you would like to work together on something, please get in touch.