Executive director and principal of the Avasant Foundation (AF) Chitra Rajeshwari is in TT to advance the NGOs efforts to provide education, employment, and entrepreneurship opportunities in the digital economy for youth and women. The US-based foundation is the social development arm of global management strategy firm Avasant.
In a Zoom interview with Business Day, Rajeshwari said the foundation, through its digital skills and sustainable development goals alignment certificate programmes, has been successfully offering similar opportunities to young people in Guyana and The Bahamas. As part of its global outreach mandate, the foundation's head is in TT to explore the possibility of launching the programme here.
“These programmes are necessary in the Caribbean region as corporate businesses are expanding their presence there and a digital talent pool is a must,” Rajeshwari said, adding that the programmes are in keeping with the AF's mission "to improve lives and communities by empowering youth in emerging economies through education employment and entrepreneurship and on boarding them into the digital economy."
Rajeshwari said before rolling out its digital skills programme in any country, AF does a needs analysis to understand the environment of the country in which it would be operating – factors like the types of jobs available, the economical climate, the unemployment rate.
"We take all that into consideration when we create the curriculum for the training."
The programme is open to young people 18-26 and each cohort is limited to 30 students.
"But we do sometimes extend it to age 32, especially single mothers...Sometimes we push the number of students we accept to 35 because we get so many applications."
She said each cycle can run from three and a half to four months depending on the country.
"Three days a week, three hours a day so students have sufficient time on the other days to study and do the assessments. The pace is not super fast and inundating because some of them will have jobs to sustain themselves, some may be single parents. We want to be respectful that we give them enough time to learn and succeed."
[caption id="attachment_1004777" align="alignnone" width="819"] Executive director and principal of the Avasant Foundation Chitra Rajeshwari. -[/caption]
The criteria for acceptance into the programme, Rajeshwari said, is somewhat rigid in order to attract young people from underserved communities "who have that fire in their bellies but do not have the means to pursue higher education." She said because the foundation is part of a corporate organisation, it does not accept students who are mentally ill or have been incarcerated.
"Our programme is for young adults who have completed high school, are fluent in English and understand the basics in mathematics."
Applicants must have a national ID, access to a computer and internet access.
"For some of our programmes we offer computers."
And while the main modules focus on digital skills, the training also includes soft
