Our people · Our community
The people who build Indaba.
Indaba brings together educators, researchers, entrepreneurs, community leaders and long-term supporters. Different experiences, one shared conviction: the earliest years of life deserve our very best.
A growing community
A movement is built by people. Its legacy is carried by generations.
Behind every child's good start are people who believed, built, taught, researched, supported and stayed. This is a growing community devoted to making excellence in early childhood accessible to all.
How this page reads
Five chapters, one conviction.
01
Stewardship
The board that safeguards the mission, and the people building the wider Indaba ecosystem.
02
Scientific insight
Researchers whose work on how children develop informs ours.
03
Pedagogical practice
The trainers and facilitators who turn knowledge into daily practice.
04
Partnerships
Organisations that strengthen teacher formation and community-led work.
05
Gratitude
Those who believed early, and an invitation to build what comes next.
The Foundation
Those who safeguard the mission.
The board and officers of the Indaba Foundation hold the mission in trust: its direction, its integrity and its long view.
André Shearer
Founder and Chairman
Founded Indaba and stewards its long-term mission in early childhood education: building the institution, its programmes and its partnerships.
Gregory Flipo
Director
Founder of Sikana, one of the world's largest libraries of free practical learning: more than 3,000 programmes in ten languages, shared through a worldwide network of NGOs, experts and contributors. He brings that experience to Indaba's products, design and operating model.
Fabio Ficano
General Secretary
Moncada Energy
Co-founder of Moncada Energy Group, with a career across renewable energy, technology and public affairs. A Managing Director at Ares Management; earlier a Senior Fellow at Palantir and director of government affairs at AECOM and Leonardo. A Commissioner of the U.S.-Italy Fulbright Commission.
Leadership & builders
Building the wider Indaba ecosystem.
People helping build Indaba's institute, programmes and technology alongside the Foundation.
They are not the Foundation's statutory board.
Rob Loubser
Technology and platform engineering
A founding engineer of Uber Eats.
Ahmer Inam
Technology and innovation
Built AI systems across Cisco's global infrastructure.
Academic Advisory
The science we listen to.
Researchers in child development whom the Foundation lists as its Academic Advisory.
They are named here as individuals: their universities are not partners in, or sponsors of, the Foundation's work.
Professor Linda Richter
Human development and early childhood research
Professor Angeline Stoll Lillard
Developmental psychology and Montessori research
Professor Adele Diamond
Developmental cognitive neuroscience and executive functions
Professor Philip Fisher
Early adversity and child development
Professor Takao Hensch
Critical periods and brain plasticity
Pedagogical community
The people who turn knowledge into practice.
The trainers, facilitators and team of the Indaba Institute, as listed on its community page.
Training and mentoring
Jennifer Moore
Head of Training
Part of the Montessori world in Cape Town for 35 years, working with groups of women who care for children in disadvantaged and rural communities.
Pru Ramsey
Consultant and mentor
Holds an AMI preprimary diploma (1980). Has led ECD NQF Level 5 training at Indaba since 2017 and introduced the CoRE pilot in Kayamandi in 2021.
Theodora Nomakhwezi Lutuli
Consultant
Runs Khanyisa Nursery and Inkwenkwezi Educare in Nyanga, Cape Town, and consults for the Indaba Institute.
CoRE facilitators
Xoliswa Bala
CoRE Facilitator
A 3–6 Montessori certificate and more than 25 years in a Montessori school; a central facilitator of the First Children programme.
Piliswa Baliwe
CoRE Facilitator
Began in Montessori in 2004 and earned a 3–6 diploma in 2005; joined Indaba in 2021 and became a CoRE facilitator in 2023.
Claire Goffe-Wood
CoRE Facilitator
Has worked with toddlers since 1999; completed AMI 0–3 training and became a full-time CoRE facilitator in 2023.
Emma Medell
CoRE Facilitator
Years of work with children aged three to six, and many years co-running a Montessori school.
Colleen Erasmus
CoRE Facilitator
Joined in 2024 after ten years working with children, six of them as principal of a community preschool. Holds AMI diplomas for 0–3 and 3–6.
Running the Institute
Illse-Jane Wessels
Business Manager
Has overseen HR, operations and finance since 2023, after about twenty years in HR.
Nomvelo Lupuzi
Senior Community Liaison Officer
With Indaba since 2017: works alongside CoRE facilitators and practitioners and manages CoRE enquiries and admissions.
Inshaaf Manuel
Administrator
Since 2023 has run reception and supported CoRE and AMI administration.
An AMI diploma is a qualification. It does not mean the holder works for AMI.
Institutional partners
Organisations that strengthen the work.
Organisations helping strengthen knowledge, teacher formation and community-led implementation.
Select a name to read what the relationship is. We name partners only with their agreement, and describe no relationship as established until it is.
Association Montessori Internationale (AMI)
Teacher formation
The Indaba Institute is an AMI training centre, listed in AMI's own directory. It offers AMI diploma courses for adults who work with children from birth to twelve.
Website (external site)AMI directory listing (external site)
Educateurs sans Frontières (EsF)
Programme design
The social-justice arm of AMI. EsF designed CoRE, the community training programme the Foundation funds, and issues the CoRE certificate.
Sustainability Institute
Campus
Partnered with the Indaba Institute to house its AMI training centre on the Institute's campus near Stellenbosch.
Website (external site)Indaba Institute community page (external site)
Stellenbosch Municipality
Local government
Made the first CoRE programmes in South Africa possible, providing transport, catering and venues so that practitioners could attend.
Website (external site)Foundation partner list (external site)
Sikana legacy collaborators
Built on experience. Connected to the world.
Before helping build Indaba's digital learning, our team grew Sikana: an open educational initiative built with experts, nonprofits, distribution networks and technology partners around the world.
This is a legacy of experience and relationships. The organisations below worked with Sikana; they are not partners of the Indaba Foundation today.
- LPO
- International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
- Emmaüs
- Ordre de Malte
- Fédération Française de Basketball
- Électriciens sans Frontières
- Fédération Française de Volley-ball
- Fédération Française de Tennis de Table
- La Sauge
- Miratus
- Fédération Française de Randonnée
- Incroyables Comestibles
- Bibliothèques Sans Frontières
- Learning Equality
- Digital Empowerment Foundation
- Right To Play
- ViaX
- YouTube
- Dailymotion
- NetEase
- Sport Singapore
- Sport and Dev
- La Bioguía
- Federación Española de Deportes de Montaña y Escalada
- Decathlon
- Kingfisher
- Renault
- L'Oréal
- Granado
- Dropbox
- Iguane Solutions
- Synthesio
- ElevenLabs
- VoiceCheap
Named on Sikana's own partner page, grouped by what each contributed.
Experts
- LPO
- International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
- Emmaüs
- Ordre de Malte
- Fédération Française de Basketball
- Électriciens sans Frontières
- Fédération Française de Volley-ball
- Fédération Française de Tennis de Table
- La Sauge
- Miratus
- Fédération Française de Randonnée
- Incroyables Comestibles
Field dissemination
- Bibliothèques Sans Frontières
- Learning Equality
- Digital Empowerment Foundation
- Right To Play
Online dissemination
- ViaX
- YouTube
- Dailymotion
- NetEase
- Sport Singapore
- Sport and Dev
- La Bioguía
- Federación Española de Deportes de Montaña y Escalada
Sponsors
- Decathlon
- Kingfisher
- Renault
- L'Oréal
- Granado
Technology
- Dropbox
- Iguane Solutions
- Synthesio
- ElevenLabs
- VoiceCheap
Founding recognition
With gratitude to those who believed early.
Before there was a blueprint for scale, there were people willing to stand behind a conviction: that every child deserves the foundations for a flourishing life. Indaba honours those whose trust, time, care and resources helped give this work its first chapter.
Chapter Two
An invitation to build what comes next.
The next chapter is being built now. Founding partners join the people on this page in making it possible.