Cyril, 23, has been taking informal jobs since high school to support his parents. From doing direct selling, construction work, and working as tricycle driver, Cyril tried nearly everything to make ends meet.
“After graduating in high school, my parents couldn’t afford to send me to college and my younger sister got pregnant. I tried different jobs to continue schooling but I had to stop school later on,” he shared.
Things turned more difficult when Cyril’s town was hit by supertyphoon Yolanda in 2013. His family lost almost everything to the typhoon.
In 2014, Cyril heard about the scholarship provided by Save the Children and partner technical vocational institutes in the city. The scholarship aims to provide marginalized and at-risk youth with skills to help them find jobs, support their families financially and ultimately create better lives for themselves.
Cyril immediately signed up for an assessment and was eventually accepted in the St. Therese Educational Foundation of Tacloban, Inc., one of the partner vocational schools, where he took up electrical installation management.
Save the Children provided Cyril and other aspiring trainees with accommodation, transport and daily allowances, and even start-up kits in Electrical Installation and Maintenance course. They were also trained on leadership, entrepreneurship, resilience, and employability skills.
“I am positive that there will be more opportunities for me to get a more decent job,” Cyril said.
After graduating from the course, Cyril now leads a youth guild that manages HotJobs Leyte, an online job portal franchise for a group of youth scholars in Leyte. As a local online job portal, HotJobs Leyte link local job seekers to employment opportunities across the province.
He and his youth team are now busy with business registration requirements to fully operate the portal; and meeting with prospective clients to promote their enterprise.