Last month, we told you about the at-risk youth having completed our skills training programme under our community intervention project in collaboration with USAID. Well, we are delighted to announce that they are official graduates!
One thing those young men have in common with the JEP Group is RESILIENCE! Despite the circumstances, these young men persevered and finished strong and are now possess the income-generating skills of electrical and mechanical engineering.
The ceremony held at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel on February 24, 2022, had everyone present sheer moments away from tears as they all beamed with pride for the youngsters. Overwhelmed with emotions, the President of the Tivoli Garden’s Community Development Committee, Annette Irving, wasn’t shy to make her tears flow. Irving’s son, Oral, was part of the cohort and selected as Valedictorian. However, her tears were not only for Oral and his Tivoli counterparts but for all the young men who successfully completed the programme. She highlighted that this programme helped to eliminate community rivalry and allowed new friendships to form.
For those of you who may be wondering, the initiative dubbed the Community Intervention Programme aimed to transform the lives of at-risk youth and included behaviour modification training. The programme also emphasised the importance of being emotionally intelligent, anger management, discipline and other critical “soft” skills and attitudes needed to be conducive and succeed in the world of work.
Chief Technical Officer, Cecil Gordon, in congratulating the men on their achievements, underscored the importance of such initiatives in providing the opportunity for youngsters to excel.
“What we are doing here is not only for these graduates. Twenty years from this, their family and community will also reap the benefits,” insisted Gordon. He further noted that while the company believes in gender equality, the programme, at this time, is currently geared to at-risk young men because they are the more endangered species.
“They will tell you about their journey and what they would have gone through to get to this point. I am pleased we [JEP Group] are all about educational support, health and the environment. We not only produce energy, and as we work to be cleaner, we also remain committed to our work in our surrounding communities. Vision 2030 is around the corner, and we are even taking it a step further; we are thinking about Vision 2050. To achieve great things, we must start from somewhere and for us, this, in particular, gets to the core of what we represent,” added Gordon.
