Downside recently hosted Miss Camille Wallen, Director of Strategy for the HALO Trust, as the first speaker of the year in the Sixth Form Talks series.
Since joining HALO in 2012, which is based in Sri Lanka, Camille has taken on a range of roles which include leading on monitoring and evaluation, donor engagement and policy and advocacy, which includes HALO’s co-leadership of the Landmine Free 2025 campaign. Now, as Director of Strategy, Camille leads on the development of HALO’s organisational strategy and oversees the functions of European donor relations, policy and advocacy, and monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning.
Camille shared her own experiences in removing land mines in Sri Lanka; her passion for international development, including guidance for those looking to join her sector as a potential career; and how HALO has begun to diversify in how it looks to support and develop communities become land mine free once conflict ends.
After the Lecture, Lower Sixth Form pupil, Lily-Rose, said the talk “was delivered in an engaging and informative manner. It brought light to a tragic but necessary and often overlooked subject. Personally, I found it very intriguing, and I know many of my peers share this belief.”