OPPORTUNITIES FOR UNEMPLOYED YOUNG ADULTS
There are many ways to help young people start their professional lives — creating new perspectives for school dropouts, training unemployed young adults to become solar technicians or IT specialists, helping mothers without jobs to find ways to earn living wages, modernizing curricula and making them future-forward, or advising young entrepreneurs. And the ways that the Umckaloabo Foundation helps are just as diverse.
TRAINING FOR THE FUTURE
As its anniversary project in the year 2020, the Umckaloabo Foundation provided €480,000 to implement various tasks together with its project partner Don Bosco. Existing vocational-training programs were modernized and new programs in fields such as green technology were created. New teaching methods were also established as part of a network across multiple African countries and a variety of organizations.
Improving vocational education and training trainers is a task that bears fruit. Our partner organizations in places like Malawi report that many young people successfully complete their educations and go on to find jobs. They remain in contact with each other via alumni networks and stay in touch with their local Don Bosco office.
LIFE CHOICES, SOUTH AFRICA
In early 2025 we were able to offer generous support to the organization Life Choices in Cape Town, South Africa, and its training programs for future solar technicians.
Here unemployed young people are given the opportunity to complete training in the future-forward industry of green technology. Working closely with local companies makes it possible for them to pursue a practice-oriented training program and be able to find paid work very quickly. Life Choices consults with the young people placed in a company for the first three years of their position, which is why they have a high success rate of 84% during this period. The Umckaloabo Foundation has repeatedly given financial support since 2017.
MASIFUNDE LEARNER DEVELOPMENT
We have long been a sponsor of the Masifunde Learner Development center in the very poor Walmer Township near Port Elizabeth. This too is a place where unemployed young people can receive vocational training in fields such as IT or hospitality. Many of them at Masifunde’s Changemaker Academy realize for the first time that they have professional options beyond the environment they know, which is often marked by violence and criminality. They learn that they are valuable and they themselves can have an impact on their future and their perspectives -- and that there are paths into paid work which allow them to make a living.
At the Kasiconomy Hub (the “Incubator”), Masifunde provides young entrepreneurs a space for their small businesses in exchange for a small fee. These fledgling businesses might be a workshop, a tailor’s studio, a shop or an artist’s atelier. Young entrepreneurs can gain a foothold here for the first time. Some are already taking their next steps: one seamstress has hired an employee, while another has moved into a larger shop outside of the Township. The Umckaloabo Foundation regards education as a holistic lifelong process. This is why vocational training is important pillar of our activities, and its relevance to us will only continue to grow.