Background | Welfare | Vocational Training | Small Business Start-Up
At Bridges of Hope we recognise that developing skills is an important way to enable someone to break out of the cycle of poverty. Many of the people we work with have left school at an early age, and have since had little or no employment. Others will have had numerous piece job where they have gathered vocational skills such as basic building techniques. As unskilled labourers they receive the lowest wages and so are unable to lift themselves out of the poverty trap, and when building work, for example, is available outside labour is often brought in. Bridges of Hope seeks to help these young people by giving them training and then sending them to a recognised examination centre in the capital, Gaborone. With this qualification they are then able to establish themselves with a career and so support themselves and their family.
It takes roughly six months to complete the courses, which are run by trained Bridges of Hope staff; Olefile (building) and Oaitse (plumbing). During the courses, training takes place on a weekly basis out in the communities of West and East Hanahai.
