Component 1: Empowering Syrians and Host Communities through Apprenticeship and Vocational Training
The first component of VET4JOB aims to enable Syrian and host community youth and adults to acquire vocational skills and strengthen their economic capacity through apprenticeship and vocational training. Achieving these objectives contributes to the development of a skilled workforce with medium-level qualifications, supports national efforts to combat child labour, and promotes formal employment.
Key activities under this component include:
- Identifying eligible candidates for apprenticeship and adult vocational courses through family and workplace visits and community-based outreach;
- Building the training capacity of staff at enterprises providing apprenticeship training within the programme;
- Enhancing the capacities of trainers at vocational training centres and institutions providing adult vocational courses;
- Improving the learning environments of vocational training centres, adult training institutions, and enterprises;
- Supporting the learning process of apprentice students and adult trainees to contribute to the development of skilled professionals and facilitate their integration into formal employment.
Component 2: Strengthening Efforts to Eliminate Child Labour through an Improved Apprenticeship System
- The second component aims to reinforce efforts to eliminate child labour by promoting a strengthened apprenticeship system.
- Apprenticeship provides a pathway for young people to continue their compulsory education after middle school. At the end of the four-year programme, students complete the 12 years of compulsory education. Apprentice students enrolled in the programme:
- Receive theoretical training one or two days per week at vocational training centres;
- Receive practical, workplace-based training four or five days per week.
Apprentice students are students, not workers, and all their rights are protected under state supervision.
VET4JOB contributes to child labour prevention by promoting apprenticeship, increasing the system’s operational capacity, and enrolling children of compulsory school age who are out of education or working, ensuring they continue their education under state protection and are better prepared for formal employment.
Key activities under this component include:
- Establishing working groups for provincial employment boards, workplace inspection and advisory teams, and examination commissions, along with capacity-building for their members;
- Conducting a national awareness campaign on child labour, highlighting its negative effects on children and society, and emphasizing the benefits of apprenticeship and its contribution to combating child labour.
Component 3: Promoting Social and Economic Cohesion between Host Communities and Syrians
The third component aims to support social and economic cohesion between host communities and Syrians.
Social cohesion activities include:
- Dialogue- and sharing-focused activities to strengthen social cohesion in learning environments;
- Participatory apprenticeship forums for apprentice students to discuss their needs, expectations, and challenges, supporting the individual and collective empowerment of children and youth;
- Vocational skills competitions and business idea competitions for mixed apprentice student teams to showcase their skills;
- Capacity development for guidance counsellors and psychological advisors in vocational training centres to support the psychological and social development of Syrian youth.
Economic cohesion activities include:
- Introducing adult beneficiaries with vocational skills to the “Recognition of Prior Learning” system and supporting their preparation for relevant examinations;
- Providing career guidance, job coaching, and entrepreneurship advisory services, and directing beneficiaries to other training and support programmes;
- Registering individuals with valid vocational certificates in İŞKUR;
- Supporting Syrians with valid vocational certificates in obtaining work permits.