The choice TESDA is offering you

For as far as I could remember, many Filipinos always follow the admirable pattern of parents working hard (oftentimes, way too hard) to send their children all the way to college. A college degree, for many, brings a sense of satisfaction and prestige and a renewed hope for a better future. However, there are parents who are either too poor to afford a college education for their growing number of children (and readily admits it), or just abominably neglectful such that their children who dreams to be respected professionals someday developed survival skills early on.

Hopeless as the latter picture may sound, these parents and children must remember they still have a choice--an alternative to a college degree and an opportunity to end their state of poverty.

The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) offers technical-vocational education and training (TVET) that increases one’s skills and chances of getting hired by industries that demand their skills.

In Cebu, for instance, where businesses are mushrooming faster than we can comprehend, there are many companies (and counting!) with investments in tourism and construction that are looking for people equipped with skills in welding, construction work, housekeeping, food and beverage preparation, bartending, front desk services, and tour-guiding, among others.

What do these companies do? They hire TVET graduates. And from a recent employer satisfaction survey, it reflects that these companies (or at least some 5,000 of them across the Philippines) are not regretting at all their decision of hiring TVET graduates. In fact, they are looking into continuing hiring more of them, which is good because opportunities remain abundant.

So parents actually have the choice to send their high school graduates to TESDA training centers, colleges, universities, or private training centers to take TVET courses that support these skills demand. Later on, their children--already trained, equipped, and earning--can enroll in their dream baccalaureate course or take one that will further enhance their skills.

Even schools and businessmen have the choice to invest in setting up training centers that follow good quality standards and systems (assessed and certified by TESDA, of course) and conform with industry demands; hence, providing more Filipinos opportunities to uplift their economic state and erase the feeling of hopelessness.

The bottomline is choice. TESDA, whose slogan “Sa TESDA, may choice ka!” is very apt, is presenting you with very good one. Take it.


- Nancy -

This blog entry as been officially entered in the Sa Tesda May Choice Ka! Blog Entry Contest.