HOPE is proud to support This Life Cambodia’s Internship programme whereby two female young adults from the rural countryside have been selected to work with This Life Cambodia’s team. Gaining invaluable work experience in the office they are also attending university and are provided a salary to sustain their living costs whilst in Siem Reap.
The TLC Internship Programme gives recent high school graduates the opportunity for further learning through university and on the job training.
Not only have these girls had an exciting opportunity to further their education, they visit their home villages every week and offer advice and support to youngsters in all areas of life. They liaise with teachers to monitor the kid’s progress and identify any problems within the community that This Life Cambodia (TLC) can assist with. For example, one school had a high dropout rate of teenage girls in school and after a little research it was due to the lack of female toilets. TLC set to task to with the community to raise money and build a new toilet block. Now the girls are returning back to school.
TLC is focused on developing educational, skill and development programs as well as support that directly benefits the lives of children, youth and their communities in rural Cambodia. Their strategy, simply, is to improve the quality of life for underserved and vulnerable groups in Cambodia.
Two individuals who TLC have selected for the Internship Program are young women who have shown great potential in their schooling and without TLC’s support it would be a very hard journey to further their potential through education and improve their quality of life. A journey many chose not to take because they do not have the resources to finance it.
TLC has harnessed the potentials of these individual and offered these young girls opportunities through Education and have given them and their families a chance to break free from the poverty cycle.
TLC provides adequate salary to pay for accommodation, food and clothes and even enough for small savings too, which is being put aside for their families.
In order for the girls to be accepted on the internship program they have committed to:-
• Attend all relevant training days
• Be willing and open to learning
• Act as a Scholar Mentor – Scholar mentors are the representatives of TLC’s scholarship students, in their village. They are an intermediary between the schools and TLC’s Scholarship Program Office and to be a counselor to the scholars and their parents.
The girls have already embarked on semester 2 at university and enjoy learning and gaining knowledge. They both seem to put in over and above what’s required as they know how important it is for them to pass staying up late to study until 11pm or 12 some nights. Sunday is their rest day where they get to see their families and relax. They are both finding it difficult being away from families and living in Siem Reap. This is the first time either of them have lived away from home and both say it’s the hardest part of the programme.
They are currently studying Public Administration, Khmer Studies, Economics and Computers. Both girls have different skills, and it shows in their learning. One of the girls is struggling with computer class, but is determined to ‘try more’.
It seems as if the girls are really enjoying their work and the camaraderie of the TLC team. They find everyone easy to talk to when they are unsure what to do. Both girls enjoy different aspects of the job, one is content working in the office learning office management skills and accounting. Specifically calculating TLC’s expenses and organising the paperwork. She is excited to learn Excel on her next training course to help with the accounting.
Whilst the other intern likes the interaction within the community ‘The most favourite job is I like to go out to the communities because I can learn a lot about vulnerable children and their families in the communities, working as an intern is not a difficult job for me, however I can learn a lot about situations between communities like domestic violence ’ and went onto say that what she has learnt so far being a TLC intern is how she now knows “how to communicate with local families, teachers, and know a lot of people (TLC stakeholders). I know about child protection and I know how to interview scholars and their families and villagers.”
Their future ambitions are also very reflective of their current skills and what they are excelling at in university. In the future one would like to become an accountant in a bank and the other a Social Worker in an NGO.
In the meantime TLC have extended their thanks to HOPE sponsors for supporting one of their interns, saying that HOPE’s support is making a positive change in her life through the opportunity for further learning at university and on the job training, together providing a bright future.
