Canva co-founder and CEO Melanie Perkins will come to Wollongong next week as the city’s world-first experiment with the Australian technology giant enters its final weeks.
Perkins will join one of Wollongong’s best-known exports, Dr Karl Kruszelnicki, for a free public Q&A at the University of Wollongong on Wednesday, September 23.
The event comes as more than 8,000 goals have been submitted through the Wollongong Goals project, which is testing whether Canva’s technology and reach can draw more people into conversations about the future of their city.
Wollongong is the first city in the world to collaborate with Canva on the project at a city and community level.
When the pilot was launched earlier this year, Council general manager Greg Doyle said he had set a rough benchmark of 15,000 to 20,000 responses for the project to be considered a success.
Lord Mayor of Wollongong City Council, Tania Brown said the upcoming event would give the community the chance to hear directly from Perkins about her career, Canva’s beginnings and the thinking behind the Wollongong project.
“Over the past few months Wollongong City Council has been partnering with Canva on the Wollongong Goals project and this event is an opportunity for our community to hear directly from Mel and her inspiring life views,” Cr Brown said.
“And she’s joined for this talk by one of our city’s most loved home-grown figures.
“Dr Karl has inspired so many of us with his passion for science and his ability to articulate complex and detailed matters in an easily understandable way.”
The Wollongong Goals pilot asks residents to nominate goals they would like to see achieved for their community, Australia and the world.
People can submit their ideas online or through purpose-built letterboxes and smaller collection boxes at community centres and libraries.
Perkins said the project’s concept was straightforward.
“Wollongong Goals is a really simple idea: ask people what they hope for, and listen,” she said.
Canva has long had a connection with Wollongong.
“We ran some of our very first community workshops here in the very early days, long before most people had heard of Canva,” Perkins said.
“The City of Wollongong has always been open to dreaming big.”
The goals collection will now run until October 5, with Canva to collate the results into a report.
Council plans to compare the findings with the four goals contained in its Community Strategic Plan to determine whether the priorities identified through its previous consultation still align with what residents are saying through the Canva experiment.
Big Questions: Dr Karl and Melanie Perkins, In Conversation will be held at the University of Wollongong from 5.30pm to 7pm on Wednesday, September 23.
The event is free. Register here.