“I am a new facilitator for CEFA, and was therefore as new to the E-learning platform as my learners were. With thanks to the wonderful guidance of Henning Lubbe, who is part of CEFA’s technical team, I quickly became confident with the platform and can now navigate my way around it quite easily.
I am also proud to say the same of most of my learners. One learner who immediately comes to mind is a 38-year old woman from a rural town in the Eastern Cape. She admitted to having more or less no computer experience before this course and at times really struggled with the technology. Henning regularly helped and guided her in the beginning, but agreed with me that her desire to overcome this technological challenge was inspiring. She made me realise that these learners learn so much more than the course content for Social Auxiliary Work. They also learn the skill of working with technology and overcoming challenges without giving up. This learner was also very shy in the beginning and never switched on her camera during Microsoft Teams meetings. Now she switches her camera on with pride and takes part in discussions with much more self-confidence.
The biggest challenge for me during Cycle 1 was the network problems some learners experienced during important events, like Microsoft Teams Meetings and exams. One of my learner’s laptops crashed right when the exam started. She quickly made a plan and got another laptop from a family member a few minutes later, but when she had to upload her exam paper, her network gave problems and she could not upload her exam paper on time, despite trying non-stop for 15 minutes. Technology is not always your friend…
During my first Microsoft Teams meeting with the learners after doing their practical training, I was excited to hear quite a few of them saying that they definitely made the right decision to study Social Auxiliary Work. They experienced the practical training as positive, and it made them realise that being a Social Auxiliary Worker is exactly what they want to do with their lives. One of them told the story of how they were part of a team reuniting a child with their family after being in alternative care, and how it inspired her. The excitement in her voice, inspired me again as well.” – Lizelle Fourie.