Practical Skills and Business Theory
Community Opportunity runs a series of skills training courses in carpentry, tailoring and knitwear for students at Samalani.
Alongside this the students are trained in business theory.
The aim of this is to help local young people gain the skills needed to find employment, to promote self-sufficiency and the ability for a young person to ‘stand on their own two feet’.
Vocational Business Theory
In liaison with members of the Sussex University Business Studies department, a business skills training pack has been created. With the help of a local graphic designer several copies of both the student and the teacher books have been published. They have been distributed to the Samalani centre.
Each book comprises of 10 lessons, the topics ranging from teamwork, competition and leadership to writing a business plan, marketing and basic economic principles.
Each lesson is focussed around an activity which aims to place the theoretical learning into a practical context, with a group or class discussion at the end of each lesson to consolidate the learning. So far forty students have completed this programme.
Practical Skills
Samson, our Malawian director, has recruited local trades people to teach carpentry, tailoring and knitting to the students.
Community Opportunity has funded the wages, tools, materials and a purpose built classroom and working shelter. Our partner 'Tools for Self Reliance' have supplied and shipped, ten sewing machines and over one hundred carpentry tools to the centre, and Community Opportunity supplied a PASSAP machine for knitting.
On completion of the theoretical and practical skills training programme our aim is to enable the students to set up their own businesses in the local market.
The ultimate purpose of this is to grant the students independence and self-sufficiency.
Secondly, the aim is to support the Samalani centre with a percentage of the profit going to the centre in order to fund their other programmes which are aimed at caring for vulnerable groups within the community.
Community Opportunity has funded the wages, tools, materials and a purpose built classroom and working shelter. Our partner 'Tools for Self Reliance' have supplied and shipped, ten sewing machines and over one hundred carpentry tools to the centre, and Community Opportunity supplied a PASSAP machine for knitting.
On completion of the theoretical and practical skills training programme our aim is to enable the students to set up their own businesses in the local market.
The ultimate purpose of this is to grant the students independence and self-sufficiency.
Secondly, the aim is to support the Samalani centre with a percentage of the profit going to the centre in order to fund their other programmes which are aimed at caring for vulnerable groups within the community.
