Daniel Agudelo Navarro

What are you leading?

I am an advisor for complex territories at the Ministry of Education, leading technical teams in order to develop policy education policy strategies for regions in Colombia who have quality, coverage and social systemic challenges. My work has a specific focus on peace educational programs and pedagogic models with African-Colombians and indigenous communities. I visit schools, work with local governments in complex regions, coordinate technical teams in Ministry of Education, generate alliances with public and private organizations and submit reports and recommendations to the Ministry.

In addition, I am founder and co-director of and NGO called “Veo Luego Aprendo” (See then I learn) whose objective is to develop medical and pedagogical brigades in regions with high needs, focus on visual health and related learning problems. In our first year, we have attended nearly 1.000 students, giving more than 200 pair of glasses and working with a network of more than 50 teachers and 150 parents of rural and urban schools.

How did your experiences as a fellow inspire or prepare you for what you’re doing now?

During my experience as a fellow of Enseña Por Colombia I worked as math teacher in a rural school in the Urabá region, one of the places in Colombia most affected by all the violence history. Also, I led two sports projects with my students, a female soccer team and an ultimate frisbee club.

As a teacher I had the opportunity to understand how education can change realities on a rural community in my country. Working together with students, parents, colleagues and social leaders was a powerful experience not only for my professional career, but also for my life. Teaching math gave me academic and pedagogical challenges to study curriculum, bibliography and learning process.

Creating and developing sports projects I learned how to implement initiatives since the beginning, build alliances with private and public organizations and enjoy one of my biggest passion; sports. The connection with my students in sports teams gave me energy to create ideas, grown up and work as hard as possible.

What's next?

In the short term I want to learn as much as possible during my experience in the National Ministry of Education and to impulse my entrepreneur social project with the NGO. In the mid-term I’m planning to study a public policy master and my dream in the future is to grow the NGO as much as possible and continue working in the public sector, transforming the educational system in my country