TESDA launches 2017 community-based training program at Davao City jails

“Give fish to a man and he will eat for a day; teach a man how to fish and he will have food everyday.” Inspired by these words of wisdom, TESDA Davao Sur Provincial Office, through its Provincial Director Engr. Nestor Tabada, launched last September 13, 2017 its Community–Based Training Program for inmates of Davao City Jail at the Ray of Hope Village. The main objective of the training is to provide inmates with necessary technical skills to earn a decent living, either while still in detention or when they are released to be able to support their families without having to return to illegal activities.

The training initially covers seven skills: welding, beauty care and make-up, massage therapy, cooking, dressmaking, baking and food processing. More skills will be introduced as the program progresses. During the launching, ROH Warden Cecilia Madianda urged the inmates to value these skills as their ticket to a better life. Training lessons start September 19, 2017 at the ROH Female Jail simultaneously with the orientation about the TESDA program given to inmates of Annex Jail (for the sick and/or elderly male inmates).

First training for Annex inmates will be Massage Therapy to be conducted by TESDA- Accredited Trainors from Davao Doctors Hospital. As of this writing, 200 out of the 574 female inmates have already enrolled while those from Annex will be determined next week.

TESDA-Dvo Sur Provincial Director Engr. Nestor Tabada encouraged the inmates to learn as many skills as they could while they can. “Kung naa kay abilidad, di jud ka magutman’, he said. He further stated that this training program in the jail is already a regular program of the government; he urged the BJMP to put up its own training centers where skills assessment of graduate inmates can be done right inside the jail.

Those inmates who excel in their chosen skills can undergo the Trainor’s Training, if they qualify they will receive the National Trainor Certificate as TESDA Trainor among inmates. He also told the inmates that once they are released from detention, they can apply with TESDA as an Accredited Trainor. Skills training for family members of indigent inmates will also be given outside the jail. For this purpose, ACPW is looking for a place to be used as training center.

This program in the jails is the result of coordinated efforts of TESDA DavSur, through PD Engr Nestor Tabada and staff; the BJMP ROXI through DCJ Ray of Hope Village Warden J/INSP Cecilia R. Madianda DMD and ROH Chief IWD SJO2 Lilaine U. Pacan; DCJ Annex Warden J/Supt Jonathan I. Lavapie MPA, DSC and Annex Chief IWD SJO3 Edwin Lim Naidas; with the Archdiocesan Commission on Prison Welfare (ACPW). (Marian Carmela Raquel)