Vocational Training for Young People in Brazil

Dream Learn Work’s mission is to give youth from less developed areas opportunities for a better future through education and employment.

Introduction

After our break in January we started the year with our planning meetings, setting goals and objectives for 2018. This report outlines Dream Learn Work`s activities on the first quarter of this year.

Recruitment

As many of our current participants are at the end of their educational journey with us, finishing their vocational training, looking for jobs and continuing their development, we have been able to open opportunities for more young people. Soon we will have 60 more professional dreams to encourage and support. The selection process has started and is being carried out in cooperation with our partner NGOs. The majority of local NGOs give support until around 18 years old, DLW offers a unique development opportunity beyond this stage. Current NGO partners: Projeto Karanba, Abrigo Rainha Silvia, Instituto Bola pra Frente, Instituto Rogerio Steinberg, Luta Pela Paz and Projeto Grael.

 2018 Courses

The aim this year is to provide 100 course seats, so far we have had 30 participants on basic and qualification courses. They are in a wide range of study areas and are a mix of introduction and longer courses. The initial courses give basic knowledge and are an introduction to a subject; after that longer, qualification courses, prepare then for an entry level position in a company and to follow on to a vocational training course. Being able to secure a formal job is very important to our participants.

Company Visit

Our participants are young and have little or no experience in searching and applying for jobs. That is why DLW organizes workshops and training that are delivered by experienced HR personnel from partner companies and provide important tools to develop our students job search competencies, improving their chances in a very competitive labour market.

Micro Projects

DLW is preparing to launch micro projets on GlobalGiving. Since February, we have been working with a professional film making crew who has offered to volunteer. Together we are creating short personal stories, aiming to share the life and dreams of a chosen group of our participants who wish to do a vocational training course. Each story will become a micro project. More to come soon.  

Marielle Franco

(27 July 1979 – 14 March 2018)

As many of you know, City Councilwoman Marielle Franco was killed in downtown Rio de Janeiro last month, in what officials have concluded has been a targeted political assassination. We need to write about her as she was a human rights activist that was born and raised in Maré - a favela complex where many of participants come from. She was a promising, charismatic and beloved political figure that fought for the rights of the most marginalised in Rio, especially poor women of colour and members of the LGBT community, and was a vocal critic of police violence. Amnesty International has called on the Brazilian authorities to conduct a prompt, thorough, impartial and independent investigation that not only identifies the shooters, but also those who ordered the killing. 

She is a story of success, having studied at a free preparatory school in the favela, being admitted into one of the most prestigious private universities in the country with a scholarship to study social sciences and earning a master’s degree in public administration from the Fluminense Federal University. She came from the slum, got a degree and a masters, was elected and worked hard to include the excluded. We will never forget her. "Marielle, presente. Hoje e sempre."

Dream Learn Work’s mission is to give youth from less developed areas opportunities for a better future through education and employment.

WELCOME

We hope that 2018 has started well to you all. Our 2017 journey has been full of dreams, learning and hard work, with plenty of success and many challenges. This report provides a quick overview of our program activities, covering the three pillars of our organization: Dream, Learn and Work.

OUR GOALS

Dream: Encourage young people to choose education, inspiring them to dream of a better future through learning and work.

Learn: Offer excellent training opportunities and continued individual follow up.

Work: Understanding the labour market, creating initiatives to increase our participants chances in finding formal employment.

DREAM, LEARN AND WORK

DREAM: Our participants are recruited from local social projects, active in less developed areas of Rio de Janeiro; we then create an educational path for each young person, based on their dreams, interests and abilities. Dream Learn Work makes an active effort to encourage participants to dream, to aim higher and create better futures for themselves through education and employment.  In 2017 our motivational workshop was delivered in partnership with a theatre company, helping our participants to express themselves better and have open discussions about their professional future.

‘’My dreams are: to become an electrical engineer, to have my own house and to be able to provide for my family. In order to become an electrical engineer I have to study, but it is hard to get into university when you have attended state schools your whole life, and have to compete with people who have had the opportunity to go to private schools. The quality of education are very different. So I have to work really hard to learn the same subjects, at the same level, as those who went to private schools,‘’ Wendell (19). Wendell will finish his vocational training as an electrician in a couple of months and has been accepted into a private university with 100% grant to study electrical engineering. As a qualified electrician he will be able to study and work.

LEARN: With the path established, we sponsor vocational training and courses in a wide range of areas at acknowledged educational institutions. Our students receive regular follow-up and mentoring during their educational journey. In 2017 we followed the educational path of participants engaged in 2015 and 2016, having less openings to new recruits.  DLW sponsored 95 course seats in 2017, achieving a 95% completion rate.

WORK: To close the cycle and to bring participants closer to the labour market, we organize, with the support and collaboration of corporate partners, activities related to work and employment, such as mentoring at partner companies, CV building and job search workshops. We closed the year with 40% of our participants in employment, over half of them in employment related to their area of qualification.

Challenges

As the economic and political crisis in Brazil deepened we had to adapt and change. We continued to evolve and think outside of the box, establishing partnerships and alternative ways to develop our participants further. One of the innovative ways to raise funds was our application to take part on Global Giving’s September accelerator campaign. We were very happy and grateful to have graduated, achieving partner status. Dream Learn Work ranked 35th out of 627 projects during the campaign; today we are number 286 out of 26,182 projects. Thank you once again for all your support!!

2018 planning

January is high summer in Brazil and the DLW team is enjoying a deserved break. We will come back in February with batteries recharged to plan a year full of activities and events. Soon we will send more updates on our projects and initiatives!

The DLW Team