Female students give testimony on practical study of electronics
The Catholic Youth Organisation (CYO) Technical and Vocational Institute at Sovie in the Kpando municipality in the Volta Region has held an open day to showcase the achievements of some female students in the practical study of electronics at the Institute.
Advertisement
It was on the theme, “Female Professionals in Electronics (FPE)” and was jointly sponsored by the German Development Organisation (GIZ), the Council for Technical and Vocational Education Training (COTVET), Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) and SAMSUNG.
The programme was partly designed to boost the number of girls and young women in the technical sector to fight youth unemployment.
At an open day recently, two beneficiaries of the project gave vivid testimony of their experiences on the course and the field during internship.
First testimony
According to Miss Vida Gedze, the progamme had indeed been “a game changer and Messiah to my fellow beneficiaries and l, delivering us from the powerful clutches of ignorance to knowledge.”
“This programme has laid a very solid foundation for us to venture into establishing and running our own electronic shops to earn a living and create employment for ourselves and others or further our education to the highest level and by virtue of these skills we can confidently fix multi TV discs and service same”, she said.
Second testimony
For her part, Miss Diana Agblor said “the programme has come just in the nick of time to lift me and my fellow beneficiaries from the abyss of ignorance, which has indeed given us a hope for the future”.
She said the useful skills made it possible for them to repair a wide range of electronic gadgets including mobile phones, earpieces and radio sets and that the programme had added enormous values to their lives, whipped up public confidence in them and looked forward to the future with immense hope.
Miss Agblor also said they had been exposed to an array of modern electronic gadgets including washing machines, air conditioners, home theatres and electronic cookers and had acquired skills that would guarantee them sustainable livelihood now and in the future.
Acquisition of skills
In an address, the Technical Advisor for Employment for Sustainable Development of GIZ, Ms Affi Agbenyo, said the acquisition of a degree was only a means to an end but acquiring it with skills would make one to endure in the turbulent world of rising unemployment that had forced many girls to fall by the wayside and became prey to social vices.
She said similar programs were adopted at the Pentecost Vocational Training Centre at Gbawe, the Accra Girls Vocational Institute and the Don Bosco Vocational Institute at Ashaiman, all in the Greater Accra Region.
Assurance
In a speech read on his behalf, the Deputy Volta Regional Minister, Mr Maxwell Qophy Blagodzi, reassured the people that the government was committed to transforming technical and vocational training to become a career path for the youth to serve as the hub for the manufacturing and processing sectors of the economy.
The principal of the Sovie institute, Rev. Father Jeremiah Ankutsitsia, said the gap between theory and practical skills still persisted and that TVET must always be given the priority, adding that the open day gave the general public the opportunity to see the impact of the FPE course on the students.