Youths participate in apprenticeship programme
A lot of our young people are willing, even eager to work, if only they had the right skills. And next week a new programme designed to help youths help themselves gets underway. News 5 was invited for a preview.
Jacqueline Woods, Reporting
Over fifty at-risk youths living in the Lake Independence area will be enrolled in a three year apprenticeship programme. The intention is to equip them with the basic skills that can be used to alleviate poverty in their community. The programme is an initiative of the Belize Action Community Council, formerly the Berger Alumni Council.
Emmerson Guild, President, Belize Action Community Council
“Poverty is a crime to me and I hope to achieve a reduction in poverty. So if we can in effect empower these children to empower somebody else–I think they are doing it because thirty percent of the people that are here today are from our Berger summer camp and they brought the rest, so I am going to say that we are empowering our brothers and our sisters.”
The youths will be taught specific skills in areas of construction, surveying, and woodwork. The programme is sponsored by The Belize Enterprise for Sustainable Technology, BEST, through the Canada Fund.
Dennis Jones, Managing Director, BEST
“We have been working since BEST?s inception in 1985 in areas of enterprise development. However, in this particular case, we got the financial assistance from the Canada Fund. This is a programme in Canada Fund?s international cooperation projects in developing areas across the world. And in the case of Belize, its financial three sub-projects like this where we are helping in this case, the Belize Action Council to use equipment to develop skills, to teach discipline, to teach a sense of enterprise for young people.”
The youths taking part in the programme are between eight and fifteen years old. Jacqueline Woods reporting for News 5.
The apprenticeship programme is schedule to begin next week at the community centre on Mahogany Street.
