Maphale Julia Maphutha is the Lead of the Limpopo Intervention at Funda Wande. She is deeply passionate about education and finds great joy in seeing children thrive in reading and writing. A committed philanthropist, Julia is dedicated to empowering both youth and adults in communities across South Africa.
In 2015, she initiated the Library Practice Learnership in Limpopo, which was successfully implemented from 2016 to 2017—an achievement featured in the ETDP SETA Up Skills Magazine (Issue No. 1, 2017).
Julia holds a Master’s Degree in Education from the University of Limpopo. Before joining Funda Wande, she spent 14 years as a primary school language teacher, earning recognition and awards for her excellence in teaching reading. From 2012 to 2018, she worked with Room to Read, an international literacy organization, where she gained extensive experience in early literacy, coaching, facilitation, and material development.
Since joining Funda Wande in 2019, Julia has found the work both exciting and fulfilling. Her core responsibilities include versioning learning and teaching materials into Sepedi, Setswana, and Sesotho; identifying master teachers in each language; and overseeing the filming and editing of content.
Her guiding belief is:“Intensive support should be geared towards adults so that many children will receive more help—and more appropriate help.”