About Us

Andrew: @_andrewvaughan

twitter-andrewBio: Youth worker, engineer, adventure motorcyclist, explorer of the digital neighbourhood, writer of things on figuring out life with God. Director at the Youth Hub

Currently based in: Cape Town

Keeps busy with: running the Youth Hub, writing posts for the WordSpace, training for his Gliders Pilot’s Licence, restoring old motorcycles, working on his countries visited list, cheering for  the Vancouver Canucks.

Adventure motorcycling experience: Vancouver to Cape Town, 30000km on a KLR 650 (2007), Cape Town to Angola, 14000 km on an Africa Twin (2013), lots of k’s on British Columbia forestry roads on a KLR 650.

Current bike/s: Honda Africa Twin - XRV 750, Honda CB 650

A bit longer bio...

Andrew has 17 years' youth ministry experience in various denominations in South Africa, England and Canada. In addition to a Master of Divinity degree from Regent College, Vancouver, Andrew has an MSc in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Cape Town. Andrew founded and now runs the Youth Hub - including the WordSpace project - in Cape Town, South Africa.

The Youth Hub was formed as a response to the need to equip youth leaders to engage their youth communities with sound theology that helps them figure out life with God in the real-world. The Youth Hub focuses on the exploring and innovating ways to bring together the reach and effectiveness of social media through digital communication platforms and the transformative power of embodied communities.

The WordSpace has been a key project since August 2012. Short messages are sent to around 8000 subscribers across 8 free social media platforms in a number of countries in Africa and South Asia (including India). The Enter Life project consists of 48 weekly discipleship sessions that combine longer-form content for youth leaders with short WordSpace posts delivered to young people's cell phones.

More information about the work of the Youth Hub in these two presentations:

Andy: @HarringtonAndy

twitter-andyBio: @HarringtonAndy:I believe in idealists, the pursuit of justice with all its implications and that a kind word opens the heart. I also fall of my snowboard. CEO at thewellspringfoundation.org

Currently based in: Vancouver

Keeps busy with: Leading Wellspring which means spending a lot of time in airborne metal tubes, snowboarding [when it snows!], cycling and hiking, writing and speaking to people across Canada about justice and poverty issues, playing guitar and cheering for Leyton Orient (I know, you’ve never heard of them right?)

Adventure motorcycling experience: Well, I did ride 10,000Km from Cape Town to Kigali in 2015. Or was that just a dream?

Current bike/s: A 2008 KLR 650

A bit longer Bio

Andy has over 30 years of leadership experience in youthwork and development, having taken part in work in over 17 countries during his time with Youth For Christ and Wellspring. He moved from the UK to Canada in 1999 to lead YFC in Vancouver and transitioned to the leadership of Wellspring in 2012. Andy has a passion for the marginalized and for education and has a missiology based MA from Cliff College UK.

Wellspring is focused on providing quality Christian values based education in Eastern Africa. Currently working in more than124 schools, with over 3,300 teachers and 175,000 children, as well as training educational leaders from across the region. Our desire is to see the creation of vibrant school communities that bring personal and systemic transformation. Working closely with governments and at the grassroots, Wellspring is uniquely placed to be a catalyst for transforming education for hundreds of thousands of African children and fostering vibrant communities that address poverty in all its forms.