Give Disadvantaged Youth in Phuket a Future

We have made great strides towards reaching our fundraising target thanks to you. You, the donor, has brought us much closer to being able to employ a Vocational Opportunities Through English (VOTE) Advisor. The VOTE Advisor will work to improve the economic chances of our disadvantaged children by providing personal and career guidance. The Advisor will also organize workshops that the students can partake in to put their English Language skills to use in a practical real-life scenario.

We are still in the process of interviewing the right candidate for the position as we believe that the VOTE Advisor will be integral to the success of us achieving our mission: improving the economic and life chances of young people. However, we have made significant progress in laying down a strong foundation on which our VOTE Advisor can build on. In our Kamala school, we have integrated a “Hotel Business English” class which is currently run by our Volunteer Teacher. Hotel Business English is a class which builds on the academic English taught by our teachers and expands it into practical life and employability skills. For example, a few weeks ago we invited local staff in management positions in a global hotel to run a workshop with our students. They begin by giving a seminar explaining the importance of English and how that skill alone along with determination and hard work can increase their economic opportunities. It was then followed by an interactive workshop with the students role playing various scenarios common in the hospitality industry. Our students learned that English is vital when it comes to hospitality and other vocational opportunities. Our vision is to integrate more classes like the Hotel Business Class, with other vocational oppotrunities. 

We hope that with your continued support, we are able to strengthen this programme by employing a VOTE Advisor who will be able to build on our Hotel Business English Class and implement other useful and necessary vocational workshops. Our VOTE Advisor will also be invaluable in providing career guidance to our students- something that our current teachers providing the English lessons are unable to do due to their considerable workload teaching over 900 students. Your support has already come a long way in laying down a strong foundation on which we can build on and we hope to continue building. Thank you and I look forward to providing you with more reports soon.