Kim Dyball

Envision Futures and YouthABLE

Kim Dyball is no stranger to adversity, but it’s her vision for a better future that drives her now, coupled with a natural resilience—and more than a little personal pleasure in doing what others have told her she either can’t or shouldn’t. Dyball, initially studied professional accountancy before entering the community sector.

Despite her father recommending that she should avoid falling into the access sector as an adult, it is perhaps auspicious for the rest of us that she ignored his advice. From her own experiences at a mainstream school, Dyball is now trying to combat the instituted deficit-model which sends a message to kids with access-needs that pathways towards success for them are unlikely, requiring too many resources in terms of aids and assists. These are assumptions which the education of students without access needs are generally not couched in. The question Dyball asks, is why? What value is there in sustaining this segregated expectation where access needs are concerned and why can we not invest in these young people early?

SHIFT TO POSSIBILITY

Dyball’s convictions around youth development eventuated in youthABLE, an initiative she set up in the Waikato area and which is moving into it’s second year. Rather than waiting around to treat the projected employment averages for access-need citizens as adults, Dyball seeks to address the generative issue, which is systematic well before this time. Obviously in a system not geared for their success, a myriad of practical issues present themselves, the least of which is an absence of bridge-initiatives that might redefine employment and full community involvement on for the access student as both doable and possible. When Dyball first working within this area, she discovered she was actively working against internalised beliefs that life had nothing to offer—because if a person’s access needs were recognised as being different by the education system from a young age, then why would the working world be any different?

DYBALL AND THE GCOP

Now aligned with the GCOP—being a Be Leadership alumni as of 2016—Dyball is being given the resources by the centre’s existing (and growing) network of like-minded access-advocates to refine the youthABLE model of mentorship towards a self determined community, outside it’s humble beginnings of one-on-one support as well as building a community of youth and whanua. In essence Dyball is attempting to establish new pathways for access students, to explore their identity and their communities. Through the GCOP Dyball is realising the necessary expansions beyond her original model, at the very least trying to make a start towards solving a broader problem—namely, an instituted expectation (and message) that those with access needs are not capable of excellence. The ways in which this unconscious thinking damages potential and fosters stereotypes are numerous. If we’re to have any investment in a more inclusive future, then education for all is going to have to become a priority.

During her time at GCOP, Dyball background in professional accountancy evolved another idea that complimented youthABLE. Envision Futures will offers individualised coaching working alongside access entrepreneurs to demystify and increase their knowledge to set up businesses as well as increasing their financial literacy skills. The fees from this service will then subsidise youthABLE so that our youth are able to access a free or subsidised service.

If the current system is ill-equipped to meet the needs of all, and we are fine with that, it means society is comfortably setting up a significant cross-section of the population to fail. The fact remains the access community experiences triple the ordinary rate of unemployment. The relationship here is obvious. Worse, the community itself often internalises these systemic problems which cast them as victims. Dyball and the GCOP together are seeking to upend and dispel this systemic victim mentality by instilling a message of possibility in access students, as well as auditing the current system in working towards economically motivated solutions. Right now, the untapped potential of this excluded labour-force will only appreciate in market-value as the access sector grows. And the growth of that sector is something the GCOP are passionately committed to, as is Dyball.