Our Founders

Welcome back to the TLG Leaflet!

Travis Elliott at the 2021 TLG 10 Year Gala

As this year marks the 10-year anniversary of TLG, this week we will be sharing the story of our TLG founders, Dave Sherwood and Travis Elliott, who founded TLG back in 2011. While the two childhood friends were nineteen and travelling through Europe together, they were in Sweden when they had both fallen sick and were stuck at their backpackers in the middle of winter. It was at this time that they started sharing their ideas on volunteering with universities - one of those ideas being taking university students to remote areas to volunteer in the schools. 

Travis Elliott on TLG’s first Rural Program

Having both grown up in Bunbury, a rural town in Western Australia, Dave and Travis had seen the effects of the Australian education gap and were excited to work on something that was directly relevant to where they grew up. Over the next 3-4 weeks of their trip, Dave and Travis spent time brainstorming ideas on how they could give back to the community while working in rural areas and discussing ways they could implement their ideas at universities.

Dave says “we never intended to create a large organisation. It was originally just supposed to be a few friends volunteering at a school for a week. After what was an incredibly fun week and an eye-opening experience into what could be done, it just felt like we shouldn’t stop there.” 

Not long after Dave and Travis returned to Australia, they gathered up 12 friends and drove 325km north to their first Rural Program. At Three Springs Primary School, they delivered a week of one-on-one tutoring and mentoring in April 2011 and so TLG began. From one school, the program rapidly expanded to five by the end of the year and Travis and Dave knew that TLG was going to become something bigger. 

However, the rapid growth of the organisation didn’t come without challenges for our founders. Dave and Travis reflected on how they had to navigate the differences in both their personalities to figure out the best way to work with each other and successfully run their joint initiative. Despite being good friends, they both quickly realised that they had very different approaches and perspectives towards leadership and running TLG. However, they believe they both brought balance to each other which allowed them to work well as a team.

Now living in London, Dave is currently the Chief Executive Officer for his London-based start-up, BibliU, while also working at Ed-Tech. TLG co-founder, Travis, currently works as a primary school teacher in Perth, with experience teaching in the Pilbara. 

Through their journey of expanding TLG together, both Dave and Travis feel the organisation had a significant impact on their individual career paths. While Travis was taking the path of teaching already, he believes TLG was a strong factor in helping him gain confidence at a young age and reaffirming that he wanted to teach in rural and remote areas which he did for a few years.

Dave Sherwood on TLG’s first Rural Program

Travis reflects “it’s a completely different environment and skillset from a teaching perspective. There are many differences even between schools in different rural areas as well, which is something I hadn’t really considered before TLG.”

Dave shares “before TLG I was pretty set on becoming an academic working in chemistry and doing research, but it became obvious to me that I had set myself on a path without thinking it through too much. So, to me, TLG really opened my eyes to entrepreneurship and what it’s really like to manage people. I believe my start-up BibliU is a direct follow up of TLG involving a very similar skill set.”

10 years on, as the TLG Board Chairperson, Dave currently looks after fiduciary duties, ensuring that everything is taken care of from a compliance perspective, while empowering our CEO, Bridget Staude, to implement her vision in the best way possible. After many years on the board, Travis has recently stepped down due to his increased workload, however, anticipates that he might be back soon. 

Dave and Travis believe that 10 years of TLG symbolises that they have created something remarkably sustainable from something that was going to be a one-off volunteering trip. They reminisced on what has been an exciting and rewarding journey for everyone that has been involved. The flow-on effects, such as a strong involvement at a university level and being able to employ people, is something that neither of them anticipated. Despite not being directly involved for a while, Dave and Travis are proud to see so many passionate volunteers get involved and love what they do.

University students on TLG’s first Rural Program.

Dave shares “volunteering with TLG is the type of experience that is hard to describe. People might have an idea of the educational gap but until you are able to see and feel it you might not really have a connection to it. What you experience can be quite overwhelming. It is one of those once in a lifetime opportunities in terms of the friendships you make, relationships with schools and kids you tutor. It is definitely an experience that fosters independence and encourages each tutor to give back.” 

As for Travis, he hopes that the TLG experience allows young people to be creative and innovative. He believes this is apparent through the many pathways that TLG has taken that he never thought it would. It is also a great opportunity for volunteers to put their own stamp on the organisation and he looks forward to seeing the new pathways that volunteers choose to take the organisation through in the future. 

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Written by TLG’s Public Relations Officer, Dharishinni Ambalagam.