Another 25 persons living with disabilities graduated from the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security’s skills training programme recently, bringing the total number of graduates to 294 over the past 12 months.
The graduation ceremony was held at the soon to be completed Learning Lab, training and empowerment centre which willbe the designated home for Persons living with disabilities to be trained and developed.
Among the courses these individuals from Regions Four and Five were trained in include JAWS (for the visually impaired) and social media marking.
Minister of Human Services and Social Security, Dr. Vindhya Persaud told the graduates, “The aim is to make persons living with disabilities a very valuable part of every aspect of development and we want you to go other and be part of the labour market, part of the workforce and we want you to have your dreams become a reality.”
Minister Persaud noted, “While we were waiting on the facility, we didn’t wait to train so persons were trained across various regions, 294 of them, so we did the graduation for them in Regions Four and Five and we will be presenting the certificates to the others.”
Natasha Basdeo, one of the graduates said, “I am proud of myself because I went through the computer course, and I have a certificate. I learnt a lot from the course, and I think it is a good thing the Ministry is doing. It is very good for me, and I improved a lot so this will help me to gain employment.”
Another graduate, Hannah Joseph explained, “it is very good that the ministry is doing so much for persons living with disabilities, it is very helpful to us. I want to thank the Minister for all she is doing for us and I want to encourage all persons living with disabilities to take up the opportunity and get qualified.”
Meanwhile, Odessa Blair who completed the social media marketing course highlighted that the course was very informative, and I think that persons with disabilities will be benefitting from these training. I believe the Ministry is doing a very good job and I have to say hats off to them for including persons with disabilities in their training and making us equipped to make an equal contribution in the world of work.