Collins Seymah Smith

Collins is a Theatre practitioner and a Youth Facilitator with over 8 years experience. Over the years, he has focused his energies on working with young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, using drama to help develop awareness of their sexual and reproductive rights and health.

He has worked in multiple, diverse groups, always taking care to create an environment for their self-empowerment and equipping them with advocacy skills via forum theatre.

He has co-ordinated a series of behaviour change workshops focused on gender-based violence in his local community which, through community advocacy and the use of interactive theatre, has benefited fifty (50) young people directly and four hundred and fifty three (453) people indirectly. Collins is a founding member of Act for Change and helped establish the James Town Community Theatre Centre in 2011.

Outside of his theatre work, Collins has organized a peace-building forum for aspiring parliamentarians in his local constituency (Odododioodioo) prior to the December, 2012 Presidential and Parliamentary elections in Ghana.

Over the years, he has trained focus groups on issues relating to HIV/AIDS, Gender Equality, Human Rights, Sexual Reproductive Health, Assertiveness and Team Building, and has worked with over 5,000 young men and women through transformational behavior change workshops and theatre performances with funding and support from British Council (Ghana), Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), International Players Association, American Jewish World Service (AJWS), British Women Association (BWA), Ghana Cultural Fund (GCF) through Theatre for a Change.
 
He has worked with other NGO's in the capacity of Project Officer (Centre for Popular Education and Human Rights, Ghana) and Monitoring Officer (Theatre for Change). Over the years, he has gained skills in Monitoring, Management, Facilitation, Report Writing, Mobilization, Effective Communication, Interpersonal Skills, Forum Theatre Skills.