"Where I come from cannot make me who I want to be” : A Minor Field Study in the townships of Cape Town

Abstract:

Aims: The purpose of this thesis is to describe peer educators’ experiences from the training given to them by The Leadership South Programme. The aim is also to describe the participants’ perceived self-empowerment and perceptions about their own learning and experiences of being a peer educator. The study also aims to explore how peer educators share their skills with others.

Methods: Grounded Theory is the method used for the research presented in this thesis. The data collection was done by open-ended questionnaires followed by qualitative interviews.

Results: The results show that the peer educators who participated in our study show increased self-esteem and motivation. The training has also given them increased knowledge in communicating, listening and facilitating others. Furthermore peer educators experienced increased self-awareness and learned how to motivate and support their peers and share information.