In the past weeks, I have been privileged to tutor and facilitate the learning of students in the Contemporary Human Rights course which is coordinated by my principal Supervisor Dr. Julie Anne King

The topics we covered included:

1. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander rights
2. Refugee/Asylum seeker rights
3. Human Rights and Cultural Relativism
4. Climate Change and its link to human rights
5. Poverty and Human Rights

In addition to all these topics, the students were expected to be in groups where they worked together in preparing a presentation which formed part of their first assessment. In the 3 classes, I tutored every week, there were 15 groups. These groups were expected to pick and explore a topic using a human rights lens.

This meant that I had to listen to and assess 15 different topics. This was a rewarding experience for me because being a student myself provided an opportunity to learn from the rich perspectives of the students.

Working as a sessional academic in this way also allowed me to hone my skills. Being a PhD student, one is expected to pick my many skills along the line. I am hopeful that this experience has helped me achieve that. Thank you to my supervisor Dr. Julie King for always providing me with the platform to grow.

Today was the last day for my tutorials. I wished the students the best as they continued their studies. I got similar wishes for my studies. I will miss them.

During this period of tutoring, I was also invited by Dr. Jerico Franciscus Pardosi to deliver a guest lecture to students taking the International health Unit. My recorded lecture was titled “The marginalised population in HIV programming: An international outlook from Nigeria in the era of COVID-19”. My lecture drew from my field and current PhD doctoral research.

It has been a rewarding experience. Now I must continue writing my thesis and marking assessments at the same time. The picture of my desk shows the enormous amount of work waiting but the work must be done.