Personal Safety Workshop with Terra Nova Ceramics

On the 9th of April, we had the privilege of hosting a Women Empowerment Workshop for Terra Nova Ceramics, a leading manufacturer & supplier of consumables for fire assay laboratories in the gold and platinum industries. Based in Meyerton, South Africa, they provide cost-effective consumable solutions to mining companies and fire assay laboratories throughout Africa and internationally.

For this year’s International Women’s Day Terra Nova Ceramics wanted to host a Personal Safety Workshop for their female staff members with the following objectives in mind:

• Empowerment
• Team building
• Creating a safety culture that amplifies their company values
• Ensuring that their female staff members have tools and information that contribute to their general personal safety, confidence and well-being.

Our programme focuses on why we all need a personal safety strategy and educates participants on practical tools, including techniques, on how to deal with public street harassment, the importance of prevention, various de-escalation techniques, how to become an up-stander without endangering yourself, and practical self-defence techniques that can easily be implemented regardless of your fitness level and age.

Together with iDefend Krav Maga and the Growing up without a Father Foundation, we were able to ensure that all participants left our workshop feeling empowered, confident and enabled.

Our workshop consisted of the following three pillars:

• Personal Safety Talk from Palesa. To find out more about Secanity, please click here.
• Practical Self-defence training from Anthony. To find out more about iDefend Krav Maga, please click here.
• A motivational talk on personal development from Dr Charley Pietersen. To find out more about the Growing Up Without A Father Foundation, please click here.

At the end of the workshop, we had a survey and some of the staff members responded with the following feedback:

• “I would like Secanity to keep on with their workshops because a lot of women need to know that loving and protecting yourself is quite important“.
• “Being made aware of myself & my worth. The fact that I can use my body as a weapon“.
• “Being more aware of my surroundings, not be afraid to take a stand when something feels unsafe or uncomfortable“.
• “I learned how to love myself, how to protect myself, and that I need to be myself and not anybody else“.

We also took the time to interview all the organisations that made this event a success and received the following feedback:

“Terra Nova Ceramics was able to take hands with Secanity, iDefend and Growing up without a Father Foundation, to provide a platform to our ladies in the workplace.  The feedback we received from our ladies was positive and inspiring.  We as a company feel we can make a difference in empowering our ladies to be safe and knowing their self-worth. Such a great event for any organization to host”. –Terra Nova Ceramics Management.

“iDefend Krav Maga was honoured to be part of the workshop for the ladies of Terra Nova Ceramics. We enjoyed helping the ladies to empower themselves through self-defence techniques, situational awareness and hearing their biggest fears. Thank you to all involved for the great morning”. – Anthony from iDefend Krav Maga 

“I applaud the company Terra Nova Ceramics for inviting us to speak to their female staff members. I believe that we have made a great impact on the one side, and on the other hand, it was great to see some of the ladies talking about how they will take action and work towards putting themselves and their aspirations first”. – Dr Charley Pietersen from the Growing Up Without A Father Foundation

We want to take this moment to thank everyone who made this day unforgettable.