TED Talks Daily - How to empower the next generation of pilots | Refilwe Ledwaba

Episode Date: October 31, 2025

What does it take to fly a plane? For TED Fellow Refilwe Ledwaba, it took perseverance and drive — and an instructor who took the time to teach to her learning style. Today, as founder of Girls Fly Africa, Ledwaba is empowering the next generation of pilots, particularly young women, with the engineering skills, professional networks and hands-on experience they need to take flight into a sky-high career.Interested in learning more about upcoming TED events? Follow these links:TEDNext: ted.com/futureyou Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hugh. Today's talk is part of our new 2025 TED Fellows films adapted for podcasts just for our TED Talks Daily listeners. We'll be releasing these special episodes showcasing our amazing fellows on certain Fridays throughout the rest of 2025 and into the new year. So stay tuned. The TED Fellows Program supports a network of global innovators and we're so excited to share their work. Today, we'd like you to meet airline pilot and flight instructor, Refielwe-Ladwaba. What does it take to fly a plane?

For Refilway, a commercial airplane and helicopter pilot based in South Africa, it took perseverance drive and an instructor who took the time to get to know the best way for her to learn. Today, she's the founder of Girls Fly Africa, an organization that is empowering the next generation, of pilots, particularly young women, with the engineering skills, professional networks, and hands-on experience they need to take flight. She shares what it took to get her in the air and why the knowledge of flight is so important for young people,

regardless of whether they become pilots. After we hear from Rufielway, stick around for her conversation with Ted Fellows Program Director, Lily James Olds. Sometimes we tend to make... people part of the problem only, but we don't make people part of the success. We're quick to say, oh, these were my challenges, but we're not quick to say, but this person removed this barrier and this person removed this one. We need to start telling those stories.

My name is Refuel Lidwava. I'm a helicopter and aeroplane pilot. I'm also an educator. I'm a founder of Girls Fly Africa, an organization that is teaching the next generation of young people, especially women, to learn how to fly. I started as an air hostess and then transitioned into a helicopter pilot, then an aeroplane pilot for an airline, and then a flight instructor now. I was the first black women in South Africa to actually fly helicopters. When I was the cabin attendant, some of the pilots used to come to me and they're like, you're so smart. You should be flying, you know, the airplane. They would call me during landings, you know, during takeoffs. And I remember the captain, he actually looked at me,

Like, can you see, you know, what you're kind of missing? I'm like, oh, this is awesome. This is what I want to do. That was the turning point where I actually started taking seriously that this is something that I really, really wanted to do because it was beautiful. But I had major challenges along the way. When I was training as a helicopter pilot,

I had difficulty with a maneuver called hovering. It is a highly coordinated maneuver. My helicopter will move from one corner to the other because I'll put like one hand and then one hand, and it just didn't click. And I was really on the verge of being let go from the program. At that point, they changed an instructor. My new instructor actually took some time to get to know me.

He asked me my background, how I grew up, what are some of the activities that I did? Because at that point, I didn't have a driver's license. I've never driven a car. I didn't have a bike when I was growing up. The people that normally come to flight school, they have much more developed motor skills. He understood that traditional training wasn't going to work for me.

He sort of went back and redesigned the program. And I mean, within two flights of just doing that, I overcame that obstacle and I went on to finish ahead of everybody else. He actually didn't have to do what he did. It wasn't part of the syllabus just to go out of his way to assist me the way he looked at context, which is something that people don't think about. That inspired me to become an instructor as well and perhaps do what he did

for other people, recognizing that there's a whole lot of people that are coming from, you know, similar background that I did that will probably struggle as much as I did. Girls fly Africa inspires young people, especially young women, to learn how to fly. Most of our students, they come from rural areas that have never been exposed to the industry, and our program is set up in a way that it kind of look at

what are some of the challenges that might encounter. We identify five areas. The first area was most of them don't have information, just like me. I knew about only Tom Cruise, and he certainly didn't look like me, so they don't have role models, not role model to them, but to the communities as well, because most of the communities that we work with, they still have preconceived ideas of what women should be doing.

We'll go and land in those areas, and so they will see us coming out of the aeroplane. Now they can see some people that look like them that have actually flown in. One of the first few people in the program, we actually landed at her school. And I remember she ran to the helicopter, like when I landed, and she came and she spoke to us. And she's like, oh, wow, can she take our numbers? And then she attended our camps and, you know, some of our programs. And then we assisted it, and today she's an aeronautical engineer. The second thing that we did, we needed to build skills and capabilities.

Like, for example, we'll put them in a simulator before they can even start flying. We have engines that we can show them. You know, they can work on those engines. Now they have a clear idea of what an engine look like before they can even start training. We've got programs that expose them to 3D, where they build rockets. They build aeroplane using like 3D models. And in the third phase, most of these young people come from backgrounds where they can't afford. to go and fly. It's too expensive. Like if I had to tell my mother that she had to pay for

my flying, she was probably going to like smile and like, yeah, right, because it's the same amount as a house. Through a scholarship program, we've been able to train 100 plus pilots, drone pilots, flight instructors. The fourth phase is networks. Most of these young people, after they get trained, there's not a job waiting for them. We sort of advocate for them. We connect them with those job prospect so they can be able to build hours to be able to go into the airline. And then the last phase is the continuous support. We believe that true empowerment is when they're at the top of their game. So they need to become training captains one day.

You know, they need to become astronauts, you know, not just study their degree and that's it. So they need to progress. So we create that network for continuous growth for them. So we have interacted with more than half a million. boys and girls, and then about 200,000 have gone through our programs. That will mean the workshops, simulator workshops, and we've got a five-day camps. And then in terms of the training or the girls that we've supported or partnered with multiple organization for them to get trained, it's about more than 100 girls.

It looks like a small number, but to train a pilot, it takes quite long. The young people that are coming after me, they've got different challenges. But I've always said to them, go back and look at how many people have actually helped you. You will find out that more than 90% of the people, they actually want you to succeed. It's just that a lot of times we tend to maybe dwell on the negatives, and we don't actually highlight the positives. I had a community of people that were behind me. My mom, all the pilots that called me, you should be in front, kind of nudging me.

My instructor, all of them were like, you know, you can do this. You can do this. They've inspired me, and they've made it normal to do for others what they did for me. I think for me, that's the, you know, that's the most rewarding part. And now a special conversation between Raffielway and Ted Fellows Program Director, Lily James Olds. It's coming up right after a short break. Hi, Ref. Thanks for being with us today. I'm so excited to get to talk to you. Hi, Lily. I'm also very excited. Before you became a pilot, I know that you were a flight

attendants, so you're not new to being in the air. But I'm curious to start by asking, what did it feel like the first time you were the one flying? You know, I always say the feeling, You can't really describe it, right, because like you're saying, I've always been at the back and suddenly I'm in front and I remember actually my first training flight and I was kind of like sitting there and turning the, you know, the aeroplane. I was like, wow, this is amazing. And I think for me, just to get to that point of being the one in control, being the one flying and how much it actually took. I think it meant quite a lot. Like when I looked outside, I'm like, this is actually my first hour. And I'm going to get to actually log it in the book

as my first flying hour. So yeah, it's amazing. You can't really describe it. That's incredible. And is this true that you said that before you stepped in a cockpit and started flying that you'd never driven a car before? Is that right? Oh, yes. I'd never driven a car. In fact, I got my private pilot license aeroplane and my commercial helicopter license before I got my driver's license. That's amazing. That's amazing. And I know that you said that some of your students are the same, right? I'm curious, like, how do you meet these young women and girls where they are and help them develop the skills that more traditional training systems might have overlooked? That's quite an, yeah, an interesting question because most of the girls, you're right. They are the same.

same. They've got the same background as I had, not having opportunity to actually interact with systems that will improve their motor skills. But to even add to what you've just said, some of them are coming, you know, from even worse background than mine. Most of them, they come from deep rural area. So they don't have to deal with that only, but also traditionally, you know, like they come from very traditional household where they're not assertive. And, you know, with flying, you need to be very assertive because at some point you're the pilot in command of that aeroplane. You have to make decisions. So they grew up in an environment where they're not engaging with activities that require them to make those critical decisions. So yes, you would say that our background are similar,

but I would even say their background is a little bit worse than my, you know, my background when they actually start. What we did was when we start designing our programs, we said, let's look at the worst case scenario. And the worst case scenario, we take a little girl from a deep rural area in South Africa. That girl, we made assumptions that they haven't driven a car and they were doing certain duties that are mostly traditional when it comes to sort of young girls wherever they're coming from. And because they are socialized in a very traditional environment,

they were expected to do or to follow certain careers. So aviation is far off. It's not something that they would actually do. we said to ourselves, if we had to take that young girl and put them in a left-in seat of a 787 or an A380, that is one of the biggest aeroplanes or, you know, if they had to become an astronaut or an aeronautical engineer, what are some of the barriers that they're going to have to overcome in order to get to that point, right? And then we started designing programs. So for us, the key program is how do we then give them the skills that they would have otherwise acquired when they were growing, you know, those motor skills. And that's when we started using technology. We started using simulators, you know, taking them in the air, letting them play and becoming more comfortable so that it's not a weird feeling for them being in the air.

I mean, just imagine you haven't even driven a car, you haven't used your arms, you haven't used your legs at the same time. Like, you know, you know what goes into driving your car. And now you put another element of now you're in the air. for them is a really foreign concept. So it was quite important for us to, you know, look at how do we then start developing those skills that they would have otherwise acquired when they were growing, which is something that our traditional training doesn't necessarily look at, because it wasn't designed with that person in mind. And that's how we sort of meet them. That's fascinating

to hear how you integrate that so deeply into the actual creation of the programs from the ground up. Okay, this next question is a little tongue-in-cheek, but why teach girls to fly? Why does it even matter to train women and girls in the aerospace and aviation sectors? Why does it matter? Aviation has been previously not really open to women because of the system that was set up because of policies. And for us, it's quite important that girls know that it is a viable career choice now, meaning that they have a choice. So when I meet a meeting, a young girl and I asked them, what do you want to be when you grow up, they need to be able

to consider careers in aviation as well. So for us, it's quite important. And when they don't, it shouldn't be because they think they can't be in aviation or, you know, somebody said to them that they won't be able to succeed. It shouldn't be because they don't want to. So it's choice, you know, having a choice. And I think for me it's very powerful, you know, having that choice. And I'm just going to give you the statistics as well as to where we are. And when I do that, I think people get a little bit shocked. So let's look at, you know, the aerospace industry. For the last 30 years, the percentage of women have remained at around about 20%.

And we've only had about 11% of astronauts. And then if we look at the aviation industry and statistics from ICAO, from 2016 to 2021, the number of licensed female pilots, has increased from 3.6 to an amazing 4.0%. Right? And then for aircraft maintenance engineers from 2.7 to 3.0 and female air traffic controller,

it has remained at about 20%. So I went to check today because ICAO has got these live updates that you can see. And the number of female licensed airline pilot are sitting at about 5.21% globally. So you can see it's not a South African issue. It's not an African issue.

It's a global issue. And why do you think the numbers are so low? In your experience, what is the bias that people hold against women flying or being in any of these sectors, aerospace aviation? There's a lot of perception that women can do certain jobs. And I think once that perception is there, it is very difficult to start explaining that women can actually do their job.

So we need to work on that perception. And for us, for example, at girls fly, we always argue that perhaps the way we socialized, the way we do things, is not necessarily because we're female. And for example, like especially in South Africa, if you take a young girl from a rural area and how they socialized growing up. You know, so they're taught certain things. So when they start the training, they start a little bit behind, not where you think they should be. And then based on that, you know, then you get comments such as, you know, women are struggling or women are not doing certain things without looking at where is this person coming from? We don't really talk about the importance of culture. We don't talk about the importance of assertiveness.

We don't talk about the importance of special resonance. And those things are developed very young from a very young age. So I think it's those things that we need to start looking at. And what is it that we can enable young girls and women to be able to participate? We're not saying lower their standards or anything like that. We're just saying, let's look at the context. Let's look at where young girls coming from. Let's look at where women coming from.

And obviously, when we talk about Europe, when we talk about the continent, when we talk about the U.S., the context, the context. you know, kind of differ, but there are certain things that are still the same in a sense of young girl thinking that they cannot go into those carriers because there hasn't been anybody that look like them that are actually in those careers as well. And when they go out into society and watch, let's say, TV or advertisement that has to do with flying, it's always a male pilot. So aviation is never the center of something that they can possibly do. It actually That's the, right?

Yeah, I mean, I love how you gave the example of that you guys would land in the communities and have the women flying the planes to arrive there, and people would come greet them and see that. That seems like one very intentional way of addressing what could be the cultural barriers and facing those, but also, of course, respecting the communities where the girls are from and who you're working with very closely. Are there other examples that you have of that kind of work that you do or that you sort of fit into the programming

or the ways that you're engaging with the young women, the girls, their families, the communities? So one of the other things as well, when we work with the communities, we actually go there and we engage with the community because, yes, we know that there are these issues, but there's always the root cause of the issues why is it that girls are socialized a certain way?

Or why is it that a father doesn't think that their daughter can become pilots? This goes on in a lot of communities, especially in our continent, but in other continent as well, where, you know, when they bring up girls, they bring them up in such a way that they are preparing them to get married. And the reason why they do that is because of the economic benefits of marrying, you know, that girl because probably the person that's marrying that girl has got more money and etc and etc and by us lending there as women and by engaging with them you know lightly that women can also be economically independent and actually come and support the community but another

important aspect really as well that we always say is there isn't why we also like focusing on those communities is because the socio-economic issues that are happening there are going to be solved by those young people that are coming from there. They know what the issues are. And I can give you another example. Like imagine teaching and young girl about the drone industry, about satellite, about data. Some of the socio-economic issues that they have is delivery of, you know, critical medical supplies. Some of the issues are, you know, agriculture. How can they then use that data. So by empowering them with that knowledge, they can then go back to their community to use that knowledge and the technology to really improve the lives of people in their

community. There's a whole lot of reasons why it's important for us to start making this industry inclusive. Because at the end of the day, or in a long run, it is this industry that will make a difference in some of the lives, not only of the young girls and their families, but, you know, the community as a whole. We're already starting to see that. of some of the young girls that have gone through our programs where their younger sisters now are following in their footsteps as well. They are becoming engineers as opposed to probably 10 years ago. They wouldn't even have thought that that's an option.

But what happened is when they see one become successful, I mean a simple little thing, they drive there with a car, now the community is watching. They're like, what? So if they become a pilot, this is what happens. And then they start being open to our programs. They start being open. to their young girls doing something that they deem non-traditional.

I love that, just the effect that it has not only on the girls, but then their families, the communities, the future of society for all of us. So it matters that we teach girls how to fly. I can just add something extra as well in a context of South Africa, right? We're dealing with very high youth unemployment, and we've got the highest in the world, inequality. We've got a geneal coefficient of about 0.7 in South Africa. And if you look at that unemployment, women are the worst of in the unemployment.

We call it sort of triple challenge, you know, poverty, inequality, unemployment. So this is what we're dealing with. And there are statistics that if we reduce, you know, the gender inequality, but most importantly, with high-paying job, increased also the income of what women normally receive, it will reduce poverty, but a significant number, and the unemployment rate obviously will go down, but also the economic growth goes up quite significantly. So that's why we meet girls as well.

Absolutely. And going a little bit on a different track here, I love how you urge us all to think about the people in our lives and who has helped us each succeed and to really remember all of those shoulders that stand on. I'd love to ask, how do you think each of us can work to cultivate this way of thinking about people, about opportunity, about ambition, and how can we be the shoulders that others can stand on? So when we have a setback, we go and reflect, right, and say, this is the reason why we have the setback, and this is how we're going to work on it. But when we're successful, we don't often reflect as well.

So I sort of kind of turn it around and I say, let me go and reflect how did it go? Why did it go the way it went? Why was it successful? And it was when I started turning that around, reflecting on my successes, that I realized that yes, I have worked hard. Yes, there's a certain level of brilliance,

but most importantly, there were resources that somebody put there that enable my hard work and the way people that played a role. And I remember going back as far as, you know, my love of reading, of studying, somebody put a library there for me to be able to get that book and read. It takes a village, it takes a community

for you to get from, you know, where you are, where you're supposed to be. And I think for me, it made a huge difference and a huge shift in my thinking and also starting to create opportunities for others as well. As much as I'm the first to do something, somebody had tried and they might not have succeeded. But that trial put a foundation for me

to be able to get to the next step. And when you spoke about shoulders of a giants, we like saying, oh, it's because we like talking about notable figures. But there is those silent giants that we don't normally talk about because they might not perhaps have gotten to where I was, but they played a critical role for me to get to where I am. I take a lot of inspiration from this idea of just looking at something from a different perspective, right?

And I think just that sort of continual expansion of imagination and what is possible for yourself, for the communities that you're within and that you work with, for the society that you live in, for the world, I think this ability to sort of meet each moment with this widening perspective is something that I really appreciate that you have applied sort of to all the things that we've spoken about. And I guess my last question is just what's your next big dream or hope for yourself or for Girls Fly Africa? I think for Girls Fly Africa, we want to obviously continue what we're doing. But I think

the most important thing is what we spoke about the perception of women by us starting to show results of women doing these critical jobs and really succeeding in these jobs. We're hoping that it will start changing the perception about what women can possibly do and also start moving the conversation from whether women can do certain jobs or not to a conversation of how do we enable whether it's women or young people taking their context and their background and where they're coming from to be able to succeed in whatever jobs that, you know, they want to be doing. We've only now starting to see a lot of successes because the work that we're doing, it's not a short-term work. We don't just go into a community and speak to

young people. It's a long-term five-phase approach. And for us, for the future, we're looking to refine that process, but also to continue learning from the community, to continue learning about some of the good practices that we can introduce to the programs that we're doing so we can have a whole lot of refuelers that are, you know, that are coming through, whether aerospace engineers, whether aeronautical engineers, you know, and more of that. And sometime in the future, it will no longer be like when they see somebody at the airport, they're like, oh, a woman flying. We want to get to that point where we have normalized women in this industry.

So I think for us, that's quite important to get to that point where it is normal. So that's the dream. And at the end of the day, I'm also a pilot, meaning that I need to fly as much as possible. So it's important that I keep on flying because these young people need to see us doing the job that we want them to come in and do. So for me, it's quite important to keep on flying, whether airline or helicopters, whatever, because, you know, I have the privilege of flying everything to keep on doing that. Well, thank you, Raff. This has really been a joy, as always, to speak with you.

Thanks for taking the time today. Thank you. That was Rofilway Ledwaba, a 2025 TED Fellow. To learn more about the TED Fellows program and watch all of their Tedfellows films, just go to fellows.ted.com. And that's it for today. This episode was produced. by Lucy Little, edited by Alejandra Salazar.

In fact, checked by Aparna Nathan. The audio you heard at the top comes from the short film made by Divya Gadengi and Owen McLean. Story edited by Corey Hageham and produced by Ian Lowe. Video production manager is Searing Dolma. Additional support from Lily James Olds, Leone, Horster, and Allegra Pearl. Ted Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. Our team includes Martha Estefano's, Oliver Friedman, Brian, Lucy Little, and Tonica Sungmar Nivong. Additional support from Emma Tobner and Daniela Ballerazo. I'm Elise Hu. I'll be back

tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening.