CCT Training and Development Institute

Thursday, August 8, 2013

Quezon City Men Graduate from CTDI, Receive TESDA Certification

Twenty-six men from Bagong Silangan, Payatas, Commonwealth, and Batasan in Quezon City recently graduated from a special short-term course on carpentry and masonry at the CCT Training and Development Institute, Magdalena, Laguna campus. Except for two, the men passed assessment tests given by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority, have received certification from the agency, and now have a better chance for employment.

The men are husbands, sons, nephews, and in-laws of CCT micro finance community partners.

Graduation day, held in Bagong Silangan, was a much-awaited and joyful event for the men and their families since many of them had never completed high school or grade school.

The course was run in partnership with the Wholistic Transformation Resource Center. A second group of 30 men will start similar training this month.

Friday, November 9, 2012

TDI Students Have Jobs on US Embassy Grounds

TDI students wait for their turn to be interviewed by
Engr. Rafael Ian Ilagan, building construction contractor.

Tyron Sarmiento (seated, in white shirt) marketing officer for the
Covenant Community Service Cooperative joins the pre-service
interviews.

The students try on new safety shoes and reflective vest
a few days before they start work.

Twelve students at the CCT Training and Development Institute-Magdalena Campus have been blessed with a contract that will have them working at the US embassy from November 2012 to March 2013. Five electrical maintenance students and seven plumbing students – who simply needed a place where they could get on-the-job training – got full paying jobs when they were hired by a building contractor who has a construction project on the US embassy grounds in Manila.

After March they will go back to TDI to complete the rest of their one-year building maintenance course
which includes masonry and carpentry.

The TDI curriculum provides its students with the basic knowledge, practices, techniques, and skills they need to succeed in a career in building maintenance and combines this with several months of on-the-job training.

The young men are sons of micro entrepreneurs receiving micro finance assistance from CCT's Savings and Credit Cooperative. Many of them could have spent years being unskilled and jobless but with God’s intervention in their lives they have fresh hope not just for themselves but for their families too.

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Rey Mark Pangilan: On the Path Out of Poverty?

Rey Mark Pangilan draws plumbing equipment in one of his classes at the Center for
Community Transformation Training and Development Institute.

Farmer's Son. "I'd like to help my family," says Rey Mark Pangilan, 20, a new vocational-technical student at the Center for Community Transformation (CCT) Technical and Development Institute (TDI) in Magdalena, Laguna. This is the answer one would expect to hear from any of the 31 new students studying rough carpentry, plumbing, electrical maintenance, and masonry when asked what they hope to do when they finish their one-year course.

A full-blooded B'laan, Rey Mark is the fifth of seven children of a farmer who plants corn, and only the second person in his family to study beyond high school.

Even finishing high school was not easy, he says. "I had to hike one hour from my house every school day to get to the nearest high school."

The B'laans are an indigenous group who live in Davao del Sur, South Cotabato, and Sarangani. They are known for their colorful native costumes and intricate beadwork but at the same time are economically disadvantaged.

Rey Mark is enrolled at TDI as a scholar of the Visions of Hope Foundation, a member of the CCT Group of Ministries which has been working among the B'laans of Sarangani since 2003. His classmates come from other poor communities in the Visayas and Mindanao.

Master Key. Technical and vocational education is seen by international experts as ‘the master key that can alleviate poverty.’ While many Filipinos look down on jobs that require manual labor TDI believes numerous opportunities are out there for those willing to work with their hands and sufficiently trained to do so. For instance, while machines are fast replacing jobs in factories and on farms, houses and other buildings still have to be built by human hands. In fact according to the latest labor market study of the Department of Labor and Employment jobs as masons and carpenters are hard-to-fill occupations in the Philippines, while positions as plumbers are in demand abroad.

Alongside technical training and on-the-job learning, TDI provides classes, programs and activities meant to help the students grow deeper in their relationship with God. Students attend daily morning devotions, Saturday worship services with members or beneficiaries of other CCT programs in the area, and regular Sunday worship services.

So is Rey Mark on the pathway out of poverty? If he keeps believing things can change for the better, if, by God's grace, he puts in the huge effort needed to pursue learning, then his desire to help his family -- improve the quality of their lives, send younger siblings to school, and provide for his parents as they grow old -- can surely come true.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Former Street Kids, Future Soccer Champs?

Is CCT raising some future soccer champions? With God nothing is impossible! Boys who used to live on the streets but who are now part of the boarding school program of Visions of Hope Christian School are getting trained in the world's most popular sport. Of course joining the national team and playing in high-level matches also requires daily practice, healthy habits, focus, dedication, and years of hard work.

But who knows? One of the boys in these pictures could some day play for the Philippines. Right now they compete against other teams in the town of Magdalena in Laguna. Here they are warming up, stretching, doing drills, and playing practice games at the Magdalena campus of the Center for Community Transformation Training and Development Institute.

The Binhi Junior Soccer team with German coaches David Kananizadeh and
Maximilian Alex Haubensak (wearing glasses) and Pastor Jun Tolentino (right).

Photos by Michelle Taway

Thursday, November 10, 2011

CCT TDI Holds First Commencement Exercise

Thirty-three young men from different provinces of the Philippines received certificates for completing a one-year program at the Center for Community Transformation Training and Development Institute -Magdalena, during the campus’s first commencement exercise. The young men graduated with competencies learned in electrical installation and maintenance, masonry, rough carpentry, and plumbing. Eighty-three others were recognized for completing three, six, or nine months of training in those same areas.

Losande Labrador Jr., academic
excellence awardee

In a well-delivered speech, academic excellence awardee Losande Labrador Jr. of Bacolod City spoke of his dreams and of being the first person in his family to finish an educational course beyond high school.

CCT President and Founder Ruth Callanta explained how the partnership between CCT-TDI and AMG Skilled Hands Technological College came about, and told of how the campus fulfills a long-held dream of Eliezer del Mundo Sr. to help out-of-school youth receive an education. The 3.3 hectare campus is under a usufruct agreement between CCT and Mr. del Mundo. She also explained that TDI’s construction industry-related courses were offered based on a survey done in Laguna that indicated that the construction industry offers the most number of employment opportunities to families.

Elmer Talavera, Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) regional director IV-A, guest speaker, admonished the graduates not to "immediately look toward the airport or start applying for a passport" but to gain local work experience first. “Opportunities for employment are here, now,” he said, referring to Laguna which he said is known for tourism and is the “dormitory of Metro Manila” or the place that workers in Metro Manila come home to after a day at the office and other establishments.

Darlito Agacite of Pangasinan recalled the challenges of his one year on campus and thanked God for the opportunity “Not just to learn new skills but to also learn God’s Word.”

The graduates and members of the boards of AMG-SHTC and CCT-TDI.

The processional: graduates, staff, and guests.

TESDA Region IV-A Director Elmer Talavera:
"Opportunities for employment are here,
now!"

Members of the Brigada Bata-Magdalena
Chapter salute the Philippine flag at the
beginning of the ceremony.

The Visions of Hope-Alternative Learning System Drum
and Bugle Corps provide music for the occasion.

The Philippine flag and the CCT colors
wave proudly over the TDI campus grounds.

Monday, July 4, 2011

ALS Boys Shine in Swim Meet


Freestyle division winners - 1st place, John Paulo Caparas; 2nd place Edwin Jones; 3rd place, Allan Vincent Ramos

Three boys enrolled in the Alternative Learning System at the TDI-Magdalena Campus won first, second, and third place in the freestyle division of the 2011 Diliman Preparatory School - Philippine Swimming League Class C and Novice Swim Meet yesterday. The boys, John Paulo Caparas, Edwin Jones, and Allan Vincent Ramos said they felt like David going against Goliath when they saw their opponents -- taller, bigger bodied, and wearing expensive swimming trunks. They lost early backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and relay events. But just before the last event, the freestyle method, after a pep talk with VOH's Nurse Elmer who reminded them of instructions from Coach Susan Papa, the boys decided that they would win first, second, and third place.

And they did! John Paulo came in first, Edwin Jones came in second, and and Allan Vincent took third place.

"Inaalay po namin ang pagkapanalo naming ito sa Panginoon," (We dedicate our win to the Lord,) Edwin said.