Category: Livelihood Training

Goducate staff were invited by the Laguna Provincial Police Safety Company to help with the company’s medical mission in a far-flung area of Laguna on June 21.

5 Goducate staff members helped out. They travelled almost 3 h to reach this poor community. The event was held at one of the elementary schools there, where the team served almost 150 students, teachers, and some members of the community. There were free medical and dental check-ups, free hair-cuts, and free medicines. Goducate staff helped in the counselling area, asking and answering questions about health.

The students also received school supplies and slippers. The slippers were provided by Goducate, which took the opportunity to teach about hygiene and cleanliness. The feet of a few students were washed, as a practical demonstration of how to keep feet clean.

Goducate was also given an opportunity to tell the community about what Goducate Laguna is doing.

Three members of staff of Goducate Laguna are attending a TESDA (Technical Education and Skills Development Agency) course in Practical Nursing. The course will train them in standard emergency procedures, in doing routine health check-ups, and in simple measures for tending to the ill patients. Their practical training has involved being deployed in the different villages assisting the health workers in the health centers to measure vital signs such as blood pressures and respiratory rates and to elicit other data from patients.

As another part of their practical training the three trainees organized a Moringa Seminar for the community in Puy-puy Bay Laguna. This event was organized in partnership with the Puy-puy Elementary School administration and the Parent-Teacher Association. The seminar was aimed at students in grades 4, 5, and 6 of the school and their parents. The audience learnt about the health benefits of Moringa, and how to make Moringa powder.

The seminar was very well received by the Parent-Teacher Association, and there are plans to introduce it to other communities in the Bay area of Laguna.

The Goducate scholars took part the Brigada Eskwela (Schools Brigade) program in Laguna this year. This program is an annual Philippines Department of Education program, whereby teachers and students as well as the community help to prepare the school for the coming school year, which starts in August. The week-long program is intended to make the school surroundings as well as the classrooms clean and tidy.

Thus on May 30, our Goducate scholars helped to paint the walls of Masaya National High School and clean its yard. For our scholars, the work was a way of expressing their gratitude for their scholarships and a way of contributing to their community.

Goducate scholarships are awarded to university students in the music program in Laguna whose family income falls below the provincial minimum wage rate. The scholarship pays for the university fees. In return the scholar helps with the music program and other Goducate community work.