Inspired, excited, but cautiously optimistic.

That’s how I would describe my feelings at the end of the ICCP 2016 in Durban. It was a space that really spoke to our current zeitgeist about the decolonial turn in (South) Africa and the catalytic role played by university students. Academics and practitioners paid homage to student protests that are necessarily rocking and rupturing business-as-usual in an unequal and oppressive society. Rhodes Must Fall and Fees Must Fall featured prominently.

As a PhD student and an emerging academic, I am excited to see conference spaces being used to both analyze and catalyze revolutions. But will these translate into real conversations for change? Will they force the academy to finally end the rhetoric and dismantle the outdated curricula and teaching and learning practices that haunt their corridors?

I hope so. I hope to hear stories of change and transformation – a collective diary of decolonization – at ICCP 2018 in Chile.

Suntosh R Pillay
Vice Chair, CaSP Division, PsySSA

Dr Suffla co-chair of the conference and the scientific committee addressed delegates in the opening plenary address, calling for a compassionately critical stance in the engagements at the 6^th International Community Psychology Conference in Durban, ICC. The conference did, indeed, deliver a critical redesigning of architecture to community psychology and new vibrant theories and perspectives. We would like to thank the PsySSA Student Division Vice Chairperson of Kwazulu-Natal,  Samantha Cockcroft, for her continuous efforts with the student crew management throughout the ICCP. The feedback on behalf of the students was rich with diversity and student crew were included in round table discussions and dialogues. I would advocate that students become more involved in the future of Community Psychology its shaping and morphogenesis