austraLasia #3281
KEP, Cambodia: 8 September 2013 -- On Friday, September 06, 2013 the governor of Kep Province, Cambodia, Mr. Ken Satha, presided over the first graduation day of the new Don Bosco Technical School in this Cambodian region, 164 kilometres south of Phnom Penh. It is situated on the Gulf of Thailand and near the Vietnamese border. The technical school opened in October 2011 for young people from Kep, Kampot and Takeo provinces and began with a group of 40 in the sections of social communication and hotel skills. Only 4 of those did not complete their course. Those who left at the end of June for training, have found different jobs especially in Phnom Penh and Sihanoukville in hotels, radio stations, television channels and web development companies.
With the Graduation Day, the Don Bosco Technical School closed for vacations and it will re-open after the Pchum Ben Festival on October 7 with new programs. The hotel skills will have culinary and food and beverage; there will be an art communication & graphic design program, office administration (formally secretarial) and agriculture. The Don Bosco Kep Children Fund intends to increase its number of children in the region, taking care of the most vulnerable. 150 new students will join the school by October to reach a number of 250.
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Bess Wattchow, an Australian Cagliero Salesian Volunteer at the Don Bosco Battambang school has provided an extensive four page write-up of that event, which took place a month earlier. Here we offer merely the beginning and conclusion of this.
Bess says:
In an open hall, which was once the entirety of Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang, the first Official Graduation Ceremony took place on the 9th of August 2013, and was attended by the schools staff and students, as well as the students’ parents.
Invited to attend and take part in the ceremony, having arrived from Phnom Penh the day before, were Fr. Cef Ledesma and Fr. Leo Ochoa. Fr. Leo Ochoa was there to witness the First Opening of the School in 2000 and now the First Official Graduation Ceremony in 2013.
Offering Formal Education to 565 students, Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang has been officially recognised as an educative institution. On the 20 th of March 2013 Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang was proclaimed as such by H. E. Sar Kheng, in the presence of city hall officials, the Department of Education Authorities and the general population of Battambang.
The first Official Graduation Ceremony of Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang was as much an opportunity for recognition, as it was for awareness and action. Here, every staff member and every student is fighting for education – not with fists or hardened words but rather with an unrelenting hopeful spirit and smiles so bright you would believe they had never seen sadness or suffering.
Not only education for life – learning to read and write, to finish school, to find a job and a secure livelihood – but also education being the first step to life, a life with some of the burdens lifted. There is a new hope here, that is allowed to be in ways that before could not have been possible, with every child standing for their education to life.
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This year Salesain Cambodia became a Delegation. It is not difficult, from the two brief reports above, to see the enormous contribution being made to Cambodian youth by a handful of Salesians, ably assisted by local staff and international volunteers.
KEP, Cambodia: 8 September 2013 -- On Friday, September 06, 2013 the governor of Kep Province, Cambodia, Mr. Ken Satha, presided over the first graduation day of the new Don Bosco Technical School in this Cambodian region, 164 kilometres south of Phnom Penh. It is situated on the Gulf of Thailand and near the Vietnamese border. The technical school opened in October 2011 for young people from Kep, Kampot and Takeo provinces and began with a group of 40 in the sections of social communication and hotel skills. Only 4 of those did not complete their course. Those who left at the end of June for training, have found different jobs especially in Phnom Penh and Sihanoukville in hotels, radio stations, television channels and web development companies.
With the Graduation Day, the Don Bosco Technical School closed for vacations and it will re-open after the Pchum Ben Festival on October 7 with new programs. The hotel skills will have culinary and food and beverage; there will be an art communication & graphic design program, office administration (formally secretarial) and agriculture. The Don Bosco Kep Children Fund intends to increase its number of children in the region, taking care of the most vulnerable. 150 new students will join the school by October to reach a number of 250.
---------------------------------------------------------
Bess Wattchow, an Australian Cagliero Salesian Volunteer at the Don Bosco Battambang school has provided an extensive four page write-up of that event, which took place a month earlier. Here we offer merely the beginning and conclusion of this.
Bess says:
In an open hall, which was once the entirety of Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang, the first Official Graduation Ceremony took place on the 9th of August 2013, and was attended by the schools staff and students, as well as the students’ parents.
Invited to attend and take part in the ceremony, having arrived from Phnom Penh the day before, were Fr. Cef Ledesma and Fr. Leo Ochoa. Fr. Leo Ochoa was there to witness the First Opening of the School in 2000 and now the First Official Graduation Ceremony in 2013.
Offering Formal Education to 565 students, Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang has been officially recognised as an educative institution. On the 20 th of March 2013 Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang was proclaimed as such by H. E. Sar Kheng, in the presence of city hall officials, the Department of Education Authorities and the general population of Battambang.
The first Official Graduation Ceremony of Vithayalai Don Bosco Battambang was as much an opportunity for recognition, as it was for awareness and action. Here, every staff member and every student is fighting for education – not with fists or hardened words but rather with an unrelenting hopeful spirit and smiles so bright you would believe they had never seen sadness or suffering.
Not only education for life – learning to read and write, to finish school, to find a job and a secure livelihood – but also education being the first step to life, a life with some of the burdens lifted. There is a new hope here, that is allowed to be in ways that before could not have been possible, with every child standing for their education to life.
-------
This year Salesain Cambodia became a Delegation. It is not difficult, from the two brief reports above, to see the enormous contribution being made to Cambodian youth by a handful of Salesians, ably assisted by local staff and international volunteers.
