Y5 Progress Reports (October 2022 - September 2023)
The fifth year of YouthWorks Philippines (YWPH) project centered on its project priority sites and sectors such as Construction, Hospitality and Tourism, Food and Beverage Services, Manufacturing, and Information and Communications Technology (ICT), where employment is very prevalent. Expansion was also evident in Year 5 as the original 5 clusters–Luzon, Visayas, Northern and Southern Mindanao, and Zamboanga–branched out into an additional 10 sub-clusters, namely: Laguna, Pampanga, Pangasinan, La Union, Bohol, Iligan, Malungon, Alabel, Polomolok, and Cotabato City.
On the partnerships’ end, it was also able to secure major collaborations from the national and local government, private sector, and academe. This also paved the way for the rollout of the institutional grants which enabled the project to employ the whole-of-society approach which directly refers to YWPH’s engagement with all the relevant stakeholders including the government, civil society, communities, academia, media, private sectors including partner industries, other local and international NGOs, other voluntary associations, families, and individuals to strengthen the resilience of communities and society as a whole by providing the youth NEET with employment opportunities. This practice is evident in Luzon as institutional partner Career Builder Skills Training and Assessment Center was able to establish successful training retention and employment rates by actively implementing a holistic partnership approach.
From the policy and advocacy front, YWPH has been consistent in communicating its project successes from the field and capitalizing on these accounts for more intentional and strengthened local policies which can also feed into the policy reform efforts to improve education and employment outcomes, particularly through the Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM2).
This annual progress report aims to narrate how YWPH is steadily achieving momentum across all its project sites which were hardly hit by the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) restrictions during the first few years of implementation. Now that the economy has picked up from the pandemic losses, more industry partners from the construction, service, and manufacturing sectors are opening up training and employment opportunities for the youth following guidance from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
The project continued its progress through the implementation of adaptive and deliberate recruitment strategies through the Flexible Training for Work (FTW), direct training to employment schemes through institutional partnerships, and other forms of communication and advocacy efforts.