Globe Expands Sustainable Livelihood Opportunities for Vocational Students

Globe Telecom recently collaborated with Educational Development Center (EDC), a global non-profit organization which addresses some of the world’s most urgent challenges in education, health and international development. This enabled the telco to provide new opportunities for public high school students to engage in sustainable livelihood.

Globe participated in the EDC’s Accelerating Work Achievement and Readiness for Employment (AWARE) program, where the company hosted 54 technical-vocational students from Benigno Ninoy Aquino High School (BNAHS) and Eulogio Amang Rodriguez Vocational School. By sharing its information and communications technology (ICT) expertise, Globe sought to enhance the work readiness of the students who wish to pursue a career in the said field.

The participating students were able to gain 40 hours of work exposure from the Information Systems Group (ISG) of Globe. They received mentoring on the latest technologies, shadowed Globe technicians, and received hands-on training on various hardware processes, including PC preparation, standard tools of work installation, email and network configuration, personal computer troubleshooting and retirement, as well as software installation.

The initiative is a component of Globe Corporate Social Responsibility’s sustainable livelihood program, Prosper. It harnessed their potential and innate skills as a way to generate sustainable livelihood programs and prepared them for mainstream employment. Likewise, it benefits social enterprises, micro enterprises and the underserved sectors of the society such as the Globe-trained students.

“We are pleased to partner with EDC through the AWARE program. By equipping talented public school students with the technical and soft skills needed to succeed in today’s work environment, we hope to open up more employment opportunities for them.Through its employees, Globe as a good corporate citizen is ready and willing to share not only knowledge but more importantly, time, resources and effort to make a difference in the lives of marginalized youth,” said Globe Director for Corporate Social Responsibility Fernando Esguerra.

Commenting on his training experience at Globe, BNSAHS’ Jason Paul Villanueva mentioned that, “I am so thankful to have an opportunity to train at Globe as I experienced being in an actual work place setting. I treasured being able to immerse myself with the company’s latest technologies.”

Apart from equipping Villanueva and 53 other students mentored by the telco’s ISG unit with increased work readiness skills and improved access to employment through “Work Ready Now (WRN)!”, the AWARE project effectively establishes and improves practical relationships among tech-voc schools, local businesses such as Globe, and the Philippine government. Its WRN! curriculum is implemented in more than 15 countries over the last decade under the United States Agency for International Development.

Aside from implementing WRN!, Globe CSR also initiated last year a social enterprise based in Bago City, Negros Occidental called “Bagosphere,” an Interactive Voice Recording (IVR)-based hotline that could help out-of-school youth build their English language foundation without the need for formal schooling so that they can break into the local business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, a booming and constantly growing sector that contributes more than $10 billion to the Philippine gross domestic product.