It is often said that there is a time for everything under the heavens. This is day number 4 at the IkamvaYouth National Strategic Planning Workshop. It has been a rollercoaster four days. At the heart of it all has been the dynamic; driven and extremely passionate Ilana…our trainer and coach. Today the focus was on coaching skills. The emphasis was on coaching being a very liberating tool when applied correctly. That people should learn to listen with their whole self; body; mind and heart. This is especially true for our learners who need to have their voices liberated. The coaching lessons are geared towards equipping us with the necessary skills to help our learners to open up and deal with their issues; when they need to.
The one on one sessions with group members gave us an opportunity to practise and also recognise areas that we need to work on. We need to make a conscious and concerted effort to be able to apply what we have learnt. This includes working on our body language; tone of voice and doing away with any preconceived ideas that we might have about particular situations affecting our learners.
The most important lesson we took away today is that when dealing with our learners we have to suspend our pasts; our current situations and be completely present…for them. We need to make sure that we do not put them in a situation where we project our views and feelings onto them; forcing them to see the world through the windows of our shattered souls; knowingly or unknowingly. What they need is for us to create the emotional as well as the physical spaces they need to be the best that they can be. They need us to create platforms where they can write their own life stories. There is no greater gift that we can give them; except; maybe; for the free hugs that were offered by the Ikamvanites this morning.
Developing high level of trust in between team members is a key component in guaranteeing a high standard of service delivery for the young people we are working with. Therefore today was dedicated to team tasks focusing on senses that a leader can expand its awareness of the people he/she is working with. Who could imagine that a simple garden stick can arouse and invite to discuss around those topics. I dare you… we did it!! The below picture is proof to that.
The second session makes us discover or revise the different kind of leadership which can be applied to different professional situations. It has been followed by a collective application. We learned how to be directive, democratic, affirmative, how to be humble, how to be visionary and how to produce other leaders.
Frustration is also part of professional life and absolutely normal. It matters to identify the symptoms, and how to remedy from it. This feeling, which pollutes and reduces the human efficiency in interpersonal relationships, needs to be decontaminated as soon as possible.
To conclude the day, each and every staff discussed intensively on professional issues they are encountering within the organisation. No one gets shot. We succeed to do it in a climate of truth, respect and understanding.
We are looking forward tomorrow to give you more feedback.
The biggest concern for all branches is mostly learner attendance, as it affects the learner’s academic progress. A common issue with all the branches is with the higher grades (mostly Grade11 and 12) as most of these learners have to attend compulsory after school classes at school which then affects the time that they spend at IkamvaYouth sessions. As IkamvaYouth we just have to find a way to ensure the learners stay motivated and keep attending the sessions being held.
The fire side chat helped immensely in terms of sharing ideas and engaging in ways on how to improve each branch with better learner attendance. Learner attendance is a major challenge for new branches, only because they still introducing themselves and finding their feet.
The amazing thing about IkamvaYouth is the relationship that we aim to form and flourish between learners, tutors, parents and schools and how that relationship helps to ensure that platinum attendance becomes a norm and learners improve in their learning abilities and academic progress.
So many things are involved in handling the learners such as report collection, database and attendance. As mentioned earlier we try by all means to involve schools and parents to assist us in such aspects to ensure that we are aware of learner improvements.
We generally believe that working with the schools will actually encourage the community and parents to be part of our movement. We clearly observed that intervening with the parents is rather helpful when it comes to things such as learners reporting that they will not be attending homework sessions for a certain day. Things like this are raised in parent meetings, another way to communicate with the community to inform them what plans, visions and strategies are in place and how we intend to go forth, impact and uplift the next generation and we intend to maintain consistency in producing better results and making sure that IkamvaYouth’s objective is recurring and achieved.
A lot of things arise in the discussions we have but their only for the better. Imposing changes in the new term will be something to look forward to but with intention to acknowledge that learner capacity is quite different but, learners getting mentors and having proper study schedule’s a way forward will be developed.
Day 2 has been a day of learning, fun and bonding here at Heath and Soul in Cape Town for the IkamvaYouth Team. It is true that when people put their minds together great things are sure to happen. The day started with a great ice breaker, where IkamvaYouth staff were taught how to breathe in and out whilst becoming one with nature and our surroundings. The NSPW facilitator, Ilana Wetzler, began to challenge the IkamvaYouth staff on how to understand themselves through self-awareness and highlighted the fact that we all should strive to develop our self-awareness so as to become better leaders.
Ilana- Facilitator(Left) and Joy -Co-Founder of IkamvaYouth (Right)
This year’s NSPW is full of experiential learning and we covered areas such as tools of dialogue, intentional misdirection and different types of energy. The IkamvaYouth team has been separated into three groups to complete team tasks. The names of the groups include the Rockets, the Sweet Chilli’s and the Bees.
Interestingly enough, Lungelo Masiza, the Chef preparing all the amazing food during our stay here is a former Ikamvanite. He has successfully started his own catering company called La-Thiswa catering and is a living testimony of how IkamvaYouth is changing and empowering lives.
Watch out for the IkamvaYouth team of avengers, going through an amazing transformation from no fear to complete love!
Hearth & Soul is where its all happening. 22 Ikamvanites from across the country (4 provinces and all branches) have come together for the much awaited National Strategic Planning Week, which is a roadway to 2013. This will be an intensive 2 weeks of Transformational leadership, Strategic Planning and Team building, facilitated by renowned Leadership Developer Ilana Wetzler from SunRunners and Mignon Keyser from PEERPOWER.
Day one: this day laid a foundation and set the pace for all the following days, which included Self-awareness, Unpacked the qualities of a great leader and through this we realised that we have them inside us it’s all up to us to choose, this topic teaches us that leadership is based on service and asking what is needed here and thereby we changing the cause and not the symptoms
The day build up to experimental learning; that we learn from everything we do and sharing ,revisited IkamvaYouth Values which remind us about our responsibilities and abilities that we can respond rather than react.
All this was displayed through task teams which taught us the power of collaboration and resource sharing the Eye blinding game and the plank game just to name a few.
On Tuesday 18 September , IY attended the UCT careers expo. The expo was aimed at showcasing NPOs in the Western Cape to UCT students. The whole day was a flurry of activity with students coming in, asking about IY and signing up to volunteer, interns, or get more information about the work we do.
Shuvai and Siya of the Nyanga branch explained IY’s work to the students and got many to sign up for our Gauteng, Western Cape and KZN branches. One student, Xolile Zondi had the following to say: ‘I’m from Umlazi but I didn’t know there was such a program in my community. I would like to get involved back home.’
It was a tiring but definitely worthwhile experience, as more young people are now aware of IkamvaYouth and the work we are doing to raise a nation!
Lloyd Lungu