Building resilience in youth skills development amid COVID-19 restrictions

USAID enabled youth from across Sri Lanka to actively engage in Skills Update ’21, an innovative, virtual skills fair and forum featuring an eminent panel of skills development experts, the Vocational Training Authority (VTA) and the private sector, in celebration of World Youth Day on the 12th of August.?

The live session hosted over 900 youth who participated in webinars aimed at helping them be resilient in their goals to acquire new skills and training during the lockdown. Participants had the opportunity to interact in real-time with experts on how Technical and Vocational Education and Training?(TVET) can bridge the skills gap, widened by the pandemic.

The forum also garnered significant interest and participation from many leading private and public sector counterparts, including Keells Retail, Amrak Institute of Medical Sciences, Pizza Hut, SLASSCOM and CareerME, who played a pivotal role in disseminating career information related to their respective industries. Each partner was allocated a virtual information booth through which they provided insights on current employment opportunities as well as on the world of work. On average, 500 youth visited each of the private sector partner booths and availed themselves of a unique opportunity to discuss career aspirations with prospective private employers.

As a precursor to the virtual fair, a social media outreach program encouraged youth to share stories of their upskilling efforts during the pandemic. Their responses were used to create five motivating stories in Sinhala and Tamil to encourage those who engaged with them to register for Skills Update’ 21.

COVID 19 dealt a severe blow to the economy and in consequence, to youth development, as many programs that focused on youth, relied on physical presence and one on one interactions. The Skills Update ’21 virtual skills fair proved to be an effective platform for youth to actively engage with career guidance counselors, facilitators, speakers and private sector partners. The content was made available for four weeks to anyone who missed the opportunity to connect live, bringing in more youth who continued to access the content and post positive feedback.

The COVID 19 pandemic has created new career and entrepreneurship opportunities for youth, who account for nearly a quarter of Sri Lanka’s population, to explore. However, to take advantage of these new opportunities, they need to keep pace and remain resilient in their goals for skills development.

YouLead continues to support this process by taking a multi-pronged approach to improve the quality of and access to vocational training for youth across Sri Lanka. This is achieved by adapting strategies to cope with the challenges brought on by the COVID 19 pandemic. This includes upskilling trainers and instructors to transition to remote teaching as well as counseling and facilitating online career guidance counseling programs.