Ministry of Higher Education takes step to help unemployed graduates

WINDHOEK, Sept. 25 – The Ministry of Higher Education, Training and Innovation (MHETI) in its quest to address the issue of increasing unemployment of graduates, has developed an engaging developmental programme aimed at empowering student leaders at tertiary institutions and unemployed graduates.

After the completion of the Regional Workshops for unemployed graduates, the Ministry embarked on a journey of searching for persons (retired or matured, fit, well-articulated in the English language) who could be trained to be Trainers of Trainees and serve as mentors to the 140 unemployed graduates who are in the regions, as they try and develop business plans.

This process was concluded successfully with the help of the Regional Governors. The training of these Trainers of Trainees is set to start today, September 25, 2017 at The Office of the Labour Commissioner.
The Student Entrepreneurs Programme (SEP) was launched in April 2017 at a Conference in Windhoek under the theme, “Captivating Tertiary Student Entrepreneurs, a Harambee Initiative”. The main aim was to cultivate the culture of entrepreneurship in student leaders and disseminate the idea amongst the rest of the student population.

The Conference was followed by the SEP Regional Workshops for Unemployed Graduates in June 2017, with the broad objective of exposing the SEP Participants to entrepreneurial behaviors. Upon such exposure, it was envisaged they would become more effective, efficient and proactive opportunity hunters in the world of business , thereby enhancing their profitability and growth.

The SEP Regional Workshops for Unemployed Graduates saw 140 unemployed graduates successfully complete the workshop. The identification of the unemployed graduates was done in collaboration with the Governors Offices in all the 14 Regions, and each region was to identify and send 10 participants. – Ronald Geingob