Sustainable Developmental Journey Along with Ever-Increasing Skill Acquisition

A steady foundation built cautiously from its grassroots level definitely constitutes to the attainment of commendable achievement that would leave lasting effect for future generations. Twin commencements held last week in Sawa are amply epitomes of the persistent undertakings   that give top priority to multidisciplinary human capital development.

The making of Sawa a center of youths’excellence is evidently encouraging that students nurtured in Sawa both academically and technically have been becoming driving force to the strength of varied institutions. All the colleges of higher education have been receiving students who have been qualified from Warsay-yikealo Secondary School.

A number of students who joined Warsay-Yikealo Senior Secondary School from 72 schools of the country to pursue their 12th grade education and to complete their national service in Sawa as well as Students of Sawa Vocational Training Center graduated after successful completion of the trainings that have been offered.Students who have been trained there have not merely been gaining academic competence, but they have also been benefited from the extracurricular activities that have helped them to exercise their faculties of creativity. Music performances staged by members of the 24th round national service during the twin commencements are thoroughly reflections of the competences acquired in the extracurricular activities. Enthralling military parade and other artistic performances reveal the overall talent of the youths.

The 24th round of National service, which covers 44% of female students out of the total number of participants,is an indication to their ever-increasing competitiveness in all sorts of engagements.In its fifth commencement Sawa Vocational Training Center graduated a total of 2435 students of whom the 1018 are females. The students have been trained in 21 fields of specialization in the schools of Commerce and Management,AgriculturalTechnology, Construction Technology, and school of Advanced Farm and Construction Machinery.

The graduation events held on 16 and 17 July 2011 were festive occasions in which parents, government officials and army commanders and invited guests took part.  Addressing to the graduates of the 24th round national service, President Isaias Afwerki reminded them to efficiently use the future opportunities that would be provided. Likewise, the president recommended the students graduated from Sawa Vocational Training Center that the skills they have acquired is of a substantial importance that they should work thoroughly to up grade their know-how through practical implementation.

Since its establishment in 2007, Sawa Vocational Training Center has been continuously involved in up grading students’ technical know-how. Students of Warsay-Yikealo Secondary School have been familiarized with all schools of the Vocational Training Center through the orientations provided by the center and through making the student visit the center for direct observation. Enhancing the infrastructure of the training center, improving teachers’ capacity and providing up to date educational materials for each field of study are among the plans charted out to be implemented in the future. Since there have been challenges in maintaining some of the electronic teaching aids, the training center plans to develop its own maintenance workshop.

The trainees in the school have been pursuing their education with utmost interest and dedication so as to score outstanding results. With such commitment, about 670 students have scored from 3 to 3.9 average grade points. A number of female students have also completed their courses with outstanding results and effectively competed with the male students to receive awards of excellence.

Awalom Yemane -a teacher who has been teaching accounting in the Training center, said that the results so far attained has been motivating the teachers to assist the students with utmost care.Trained in operating heavy construction machines, Rahel Rezene, said that she didn’t find any sort of difficulty to acquire the skills along with her school mates.  The vocational training center which has been training students, who joined the center from different parts of the country has been playing imperative role in cultivating social skills through bringing students with different background to one plat form.

This year’s commencement holds students who have been trained in the fields of Material and Human Resource Management, Accounting, Secretarial Science, Animal Science, Plant Science, Forestry and Wildlife, Soil and Water Conservation, Drafting, Electricity, Surveying, Carpentry, Plumping, Wood and Metal Works, as well as operating farming and construction machinery.During its preliminary operation the Vocational Training Center used to offer limited courses that mainly confined to the area of study. This time, however, assistive courses such as computing, technical drawing and others have been introduced. Through the introduction of necessary educational equipment and manpower the center looks ahead to train as many students.