An initiative of the Department of Youth and Culture, called the “Job- Link Programme”, is going very well.
This is according to Ms Hyacinth Augustine, Programme Officer for Youth Development, who is leading the initiative. She told The Anguillian that the programme commenced in 2009 and as of Tuesday, this week, had entered its fourth cycle.
“From 2009 to this year we have worked with sixty young persons who are at risk of not being employed,” Ms. Augustine said. “For 2012, we are working with seventeen youngsters and we are pleased to say that thirteen of them are attached [at places of work]. We are hoping that at the end of the cycle in December that at least seventy percent of these young persons will gain full-time employment.”
Field Officer for the programme, Mrs. Janice Elijah, said in part: “My task is to meet potential employers and ask them nicely if they can assist us by taking on a young person either as an apprentice or as a full-time employee. This year, we have had at least one person who, right off the bat, obtained full-time employment. All the others have six-month attachments as apprentices, and we are hoping that at the end of the period they will have full-time employment. We have had persons who, after the six months, were fully-employed. There are persons who were on the programme since its inception and who still have full employment at the places of their initial attachment. This year was more challenging than before, but we were able to have the majority of our young persons attached. Just today I had two youngsters who were interviewed for potential employment. We have persons employed in upholstery, boatbuilding, vector control; office administration and various other jobs across the island.”
Ms. Augustine spoke highly about the willingness of employers to assist in finding jobs for the challenged persons. “We are very happy to say that more and more we continue to receive the support of employment agencies,” she acknowledged. “Some of them were with us from the inception of the programme such as Anguilla Aluminium. They are aware of the challenges our at-risk persoans face, and they want to give back to the community by assisting us – their only limitation being the economic situation.”
She explained that during the six-month apprentice period, her Department agreed to pay sixty percent of the stipulated wage for the youngsters, with the employment agency paying the other forty percent. She said the challenged youth were drawn from the Department of Probation, HM Prison, Zenaida Haven, the Blowing Point Youth Development Centre, the Island Youth Centre, Workshop Initiative for Support in Education (WISE) and Campus C of the Albena Lake Hodge Comprehensive School.
“We are pleased to say that a general evaluation of the programme was held last week Friday when we had employers, parents, clients, mentors and the team working together,” Ms. Augustine added. “We are happy to say that they have seenour positive approach and the appreciation from the young persons involved in the Job-link Programme.”
