Our OD Young Person of the Month is Tito Tri Kadafi from Indonesia. Tito Tri Kadafi is an education activist who strives to improve literacy, critical thinking, and socio-emotional abilities for young Indonesians. He founded Bastra ID as the organization that is dedicated to ensuring that people may use language and literacy abilities as the vehicle to solve social problems, including to make the world more fair and tolerant.
Read his amazing story below and be inspired.
TITO TRI KADAFI
Tito Tri Kadafi is an education activist who strives to improve literacy, critical thinking, and socio-emotional abilities for young Indonesians so that the world is more fair and tolerant through the Bastra ID organization he founded in 2018. This organization has a focus on language and literature, the vehicles for the aforementioned purpose.
Due to the fact that his city is the least tolerant in Indonesia and there is a lack of interfaith dialogue there, Tito developed Kartu Berembug with his organization as a learning medium to help students develop negotiation skills in navigating the challenges of diversity.
On How He Started
Until now, Cilegon, the city where Tito lives, was the most intolerant city in Indonesia. There are more than 8,000 local Christians who cannot worship at church due to a ban on building churches. Cilegon also does not have proper diversity learning and has limited access to diversity dialogue. Tito, as a Muslim, feels he must take advantage of the privilege he has, not to be a silent majority, but try to encourage the ecosystem to be fair and equal for everyone, whatever their circumstances and religion.
With his team, Tito initiated a computational thinking-based learning medium called “Berembug Card.” This game has been played with hundreds of students in Cilegon to teach techniques for negotiating problem resolution related to four case aspects: intolerance, gender inequality, bullying, and disability discrimination. Tito & Bastra ID has a theory of change, “when people can negotiate, peace can be created.” Through this, he encourages diversity dialogue in educational institutions and engages students to become diversity peers. The findings from the Berembug Card game demonstrate a development in negotiation skills and fostering openness to diverse perspectives in public discourse. Utilizing this educational tool effectively enhances student engagement.
On His Successes
In 2023, he was given the chance to work in the Indonesian State Palace as a student at the Presidential Staff School. Through his perseverance, he was also awarded by the Indonesian Ministry of Youth and Sport as National Youth Pioneer, Young Leaders for Indonesia by McKinsey & Company, won Unilever’s Every U Does Good Heroes for this action, & was a fellow of Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative in the United States. Tito was also a valedictorian at UIN Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta with an Indonesian Language and Literature Education major, and will continue to strive to continue with his aspirations, to ensure that every Indonesian is capable of literacy to be able to solve existing social problems, including making the world more tolerant. Tito believes that we cannot ensure that a city becomes tolerant, but we can try to do so.
On His Challenges and Future Plans
Tito and his team will push more broadly this year, using data from the Berembug Card program’s effectiveness to try to enlist the government as a policy maker. Tito is attempting to present the Peace Policy Recommendation to the government through an educational approach and learning model, in order to ensure that young people in this city gradually develop their negotiation skills and, more broadly, are able to be proactive in advocating for issues that affect them. This includes peace issues. All things are possible. Tito demonstrates that anybody can contribute to anything, including making the world a better place, by his concern for his surroundings and contemplation on them. Humans take a leading role in this process.
His Words of Advice For The Youth
“For me, leadership is more than just leading, but also being strategic and genuine at the same time, as well as trying to fill water in people’s buckets so that the contents are equal.” Tito said.
You can connect with Tito on Instagram, and follow the Bastra ID movement on Instagram @bastra.id.
Who will be the next OD Young Person of the Month?
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