13 Dec 2015

The Ministry of Education and Skills Development's department of special support services, gears to empower the youth through boot camps that target form five leavers. 

Officially opening a boot camp at Swaneng Hill senior school, the chief education officer for Serowe region, said the problem of youth unemployment was increasingly becoming a major national challenge. 

Ms Bernadette Monageng said the youth were not only vulnerable to social challenges in terms of unemployment but also poverty, disease and other social ills.

The education officer stated that the results of the Botswana Core Welfare Indicators survey of 2009/2010 indicated that the youth cohorts (15-34 years) were the hardest hit by unemployment. 

She added that a total of 94 968 young people between the ages of 15 to 34 years were unemployed at the period that the survey was conducted. 

Ms Monageng stated that a need to intervene and reverse the trends of unemployment and poverty levels was inevitable in order to address the situation hence the introduction of youth empowerment schemes. 

The boot camp according to Ms Monageng was aimed at empowering the young people in developing a grounded character. It was also intended to enable young people to independently venture into entrepreneurship and community service activities, she added. 

According to the education chief, the government is caring and sensitive to the needs of youth hence initiatives of this kind. 

She said her ministry desired that each school hosted its own boot camp. This she said would ensure that a larger population of form five leavers was reached out. Ms Monageng alluded to the fact that the problem of unemployment was real in Botswana.

She said it was therefore of utmost importance that the youth engaged in income generating projects. 

She urged those who will not make it to tertiary institutions next year not to despair adding that failure to go to tertiary school should not be an indicator of a life that has ended. 

She encouraged them to rather engage on the available government schemes that are aimed at developing the youth. The education chief urged form five leavers to be courageous and disciplined people in the society. 

She said they should abstain from social ills such as use of alcohol, drugs and involvement in sexual activities after they have graduated from the camp and beyond. Ms Monageng added that drugs were destructive to people’s personalities and their future. 

The school head, Ms Gabalape Autlwetse in her welcome remarks commended the class of 2015 saying it was full of intelligent and smart students who represented them in the country’s competitions and did exceptionally well. 

She said some students were even smart enough to represent Botswana in countries like Egypt and Zimbabwe on different sporting codes for example. 

Ms Autlwetse also stated that one student from the completing class scooped a prize in the Southern African Development Committee (SADC) essay competitions this year. According to the school head, it was therefore beyond any reasonable doubt to applaud the form five leavers.

Ms Autlwetse revealed that the boot camp which will run for two weeks under the theme accelerating the youth empowerment for sustainable development will cover a series of events and activities. 

Form five leavers will be mentored in areas of health, emotional intelligence, entrepreneurship and physical well-being. More than 75 per cent of the form five leavers have attended the camp, Ms Autlwetse said. 

The school head also stated that different personnel and experts have been invited to address the students throughout the camp that include among others the Botswana Defence Force, Botswana Police and the Local enterprise authority who are the facilitators expected to mentor the students.

 The camp will end in style when students will be graduating. Ends