YOUTH IGNITE | Empowering Taiwan's Next Generation

Confused about the future? Not sure what kind of job you want? Can't find the job you want?

These are the common questions in the minds of many young people these days.

 "Yes, I can! The youth Employment Empowerment Program" provides a set of training courses for young people aged 16-24. It accompanies young people to prepare for future employment opportunities.  Through self-exploration, career exploration, multi-skills preparation and  many other classes,  young people are not alone while being taught, using effective communicate to express themselves thoroughly and to find the direction of their careers.

In the past four years, we have accompanied more than 500 community teenagers and directed them toward the right career path through cooperation with schools, churches and communities. By cooperating with Hualian occupational school, Andrew is a student of our training class.  In addition to self-exploration and career exploration, we have added an action plan to help them achieve dreams to come true. We hope that through the action plan, young people can cultivate teamwork ability, organizational planning ability, and adaptability etc.

Andrew said: "During the Dream Action project, the social worker spent a lot of time discussing the course content with us. At the beginning of the discussion, we listed a lot of people we wanted to serve, including children and stray animals.  At the end of brain storm process,  we select the elder people as our targeted service group. Nevertheless, the social worker urged us to go further and engage more in-depth conversation and take a deep dive on plan execution. Therefore, we carry on to discuss more details such as the ingredients suitable for the elderly, how to cook, how to share the work load among classmates,  and cost control, etc.  Moreover, we also have to plan for the flows and itinerary to be carried out on the day as the dining activities is launched.  All of these details are not easy task and indeed really tiring!

As we were shopping at the local market, one thing surprised us most was we were running out of budget! Given lack of financial control, we had to urgently look for a solution for this tough problem. Whether to delete one dish or two or work out any other alternatives.  The social worker let us discuss and decide on our own.  We had no other choice but bargained on the price.  Luckily, the shop owner was very kind and agreed to make a deal so that we can get through this issue and move to the next step.

On the day of the dining event, I danced, sang with the elders, and chatted with them over the dining table. The elders truly felt warm because they were accompanied by us. Seeing them cheerful, I felt full sense of happiness and believed this was a meaningful and wonderful thing for me to do.

Many things in life are not taught at school. "Dreams Action project" is not a class that the school provides for us to learn. For example, we were taught how to deliver the proper attitude when serving needy people. More interestingly is the social worker lead us to play cards and board games in the class which are all a very special way of teaching and learning. 

Now Andrew, completed the training and is joining the workforce to start his career. Andrew is very grateful with the what he has learned from training courses, which allow him to pick up knowledge and skills that are not taught in school. He also expressed to the social worker that if there is a chance in the future, he would also like to become a social worker and help more people.

"Yes, I can! The youth Employment Empowerment Program" is not only about the cultivation of abilities and skills, but more about the companionship that social workers give young people during the training process and as they enter the workplace, to accompany them through the phase of confusion and help them search for the suitable career path.

Support underprivileged youth can explore life and discover one's uniqueness!