{"id":9901,"date":"2021-05-08T17:24:00","date_gmt":"2021-05-08T17:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/?p=9901"},"modified":"2021-05-08T17:05:17","modified_gmt":"2021-05-08T17:05:17","slug":"from-pool-boy-to-phd-graduate-mervyn-coetzees-story-inspires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/from-pool-boy-to-phd-graduate-mervyn-coetzees-story-inspires","title":{"rendered":"From pool boy to PhD graduate, Mervyn Coetzee\u2019s story inspires"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press<\/a> – South-Africa<\/a>. <\/strong><\/span>Cape Town – Born and raised in Bonteheuwel, Mervyn Coetzee is a great example of persevering through adversity.<\/p>\n

Raised by a single mother of five, Coetzee didn\u2019t come from a privileged background.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started to work at the age of 16, as a pool cleaner at the Sea Point pavilion, where my mother was also a cleaner. I did this for three summers because I needed to make extra income to support my family during that time, however I always dreamed big,\u201d Coetzee said.<\/p>\n

From being a casual pool cleaner, to receiving a PhD in Education at UWC, Coetzee based his thesis on what he experienced growing up.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe root of my thesis stems from my childhood experience. Born with four thumbs, I was embarrassed, mocked and called all sorts of derogatory names, but this inspired me to transcend the feelings of inadequacy and humiliation to my study which involves the affective trauma student experience in academic literacy and English Language Learning (ESL) environments,\u201d Coetzee said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI call it affective trauma because I look at the problem from two different angles. The first angle discusses the personal language narratives of the students whilst embedding my own narrative in the study, since I grew up as an ESL learner.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe second perspective helped me understand why students felt or are made to feel inferior or less of an individual due to a lack of fluency in English.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccording to my research, these discourses are interconnected with questions of students’ identity and their experiences as victims of social injustices prior to their entrance into university. These topics, in my opinion, are largely neglected in learning and teaching environments,\u201d Coetzee said.<\/p>\n

Professor Sivakumar Sivasubramaniam said that Coetzee\u2019s thesis is profoundly important to the current society in South Africa, because students bring their fears, discouragement and the disadvantages to the classroom, and this issue needs to be reckoned with.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor a person like Coetzee, who actually advocates for the encouragement and the kind of equality one actually deserved, he started with such a traumatic beginning. From that point, look at the vibrational, development complexity he has gone through to get to where he is today. Hence, Coetzee\u2019s achievement is something that ennobles me and my values even further.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCoetzee\u2019s qualification actually echoes biblical values, which reads the \u2018realisation of sorrow is the beginning of compassion\u2019. Therefore, when you use your life’s history as bases for your epistemic approach to propose knowledge construction, That is going to be tremendously valuable to the South African society,\u201d Sivasubramaniam said.<\/p>\n

Besides being in a classroom set-up, Coetzee spends his time back in the pool, helping children learn how to swim.<\/p>\n

\u201cKeith Abrahams, a retired law enforcement officer and professional life-saving coach, approached me in 2016 and invited me to assist him with his non-profit organisation, Warobile Lifesaving Academy, which teaches how to swim and lifesaving strategies.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth Keith and I have extensive experience as ocean lifeguards, and I was immediately drawn to his plea to stop the scourge of drowning locally through learn-to-swim and life-saving programmes\u201d Coetzee said.<\/p>\n

The organisation is located at Holy Cross High School Aquatic Centre in Maitland.<\/p>\n

Coetzee said while there is much work to be done to upgrade the building, they have made huge strides since their first Open Day two weeks ago.<\/p>\n

[email protected]<\/p>\n

Weekend Argus<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – South-Africa. Cape Town – Born and raised in Bonteheuwel, Mervyn Coetzee is a great example of persevering through adversity. Raised by a single mother of five, Coetzee didn\u2019t come from a privileged background. \u201cI started to work at the age of 16, as a pool cleaner at the Sea Point pavilion, where my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":9900,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,8],"tags":[274,315,275],"class_list":["post-9901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-community","category-homepage-english","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-south-africa","tag-south-africa-2"],"yoast_head":"\nFrom pool boy to PhD graduate, Mervyn Coetzee\u2019s story inspires - South Africa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Cape Town - Born and raised in Bonteheuwel, Mervyn Coetzee is a great example of persevering through adversity. 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