A Success Story: The Etafeni Trust Fit for - SAfAIDS

4.2 Fit For Life, Fit for Work Programme Overview
Since 2007, The Etafeni Fit For Life, Fit for Work Programme has supported young
unemployed school-leavers in Nyanga, Cape Town to adopt a ‘fit for life’ approach to
their future. The programme is four-weeks of initial life skills and SRH training offered
to young men and women between the ages of 18 and 30 years from Nyanga. The
training programme admits 20 young men and women who have matriculated; who
have a clean credit rating and no criminal record to participate in the programme.
Sixty percent of trainees in each group are young women. Trainees enter into a
contract with the organisation committing to adhere to the rules, which include no
swearing or smoking or substance abuse within the grounds, to respect each other
and the trainers at all times and to complete their training.
Although interest in participating in the programme was initially low, after the
inaugural group of trainees graduated in 2007 and were successfully placed in
employment or tertiary institutions, the organisation found itself with long waiting lists
of people wanting to participate. The recruitment process for the programme is mainly
by word of mouth. People participating in other programmes at Etafeni also share
information. In July 2010 however, after realising that the quality of potential trainees
was not at the preferred standard, staff at Etafeni took steps to improve on quality
and streamline applications by advertising the training programme in the community
newspaper, against set criteria.
The training offered to young people was initially based on the Indian manual but the
curriculum has now been revised, making it more appropriate for the southern African
context. The Etafeni training programme aims to get young people to reflect on, for
a period of four weeks, what they need in a job and what is holding them back from
achieving these goals.
Each year eight or nine groups of 20 learners (with matric as an entry requirement)
are run through a four-week life skills training programme. The programme aims to
empower participants to make healthy life and sexual choices, thereby enhancing their
self-confidence and furthering their ability to seek and obtain work. Overall, the aim
of the programme is to place learners in productive employment at the end of each
training cycle or assist them with further education and training opportunities that
will lead them towards employment. The programme has been very successful in its
application so far, demonstrating on average an overall placement rate of 80%. This
placement rate includes short and mid-term placements in entry level jobs.
However, the programme still struggles to establish a strong and continuous link with
industry (potential employers), and thus is limited in creating long-term employment
opportunities for the graduated learners. New ways of operating the programme,
conducting the training and establishing industry links are being considered in order to
close this significant gap on a sustainable basis. Furthermore, funders have prompted
scale-up of the programme to offer school-leavers across the country the same
opportunities of the Etafeni Fit For Life, Fit for Work Programme.
The programme has been replicated in three other sites in South Africa (Hillbrow,
Tzaneen and Vygrond) with some modifications and some differences in the
application of the model. To date 120 graduates have passed through the programme
each year for the past four years, generating a total of 480 learners trained. Sixty
percent of the graduates are female, which is a positive impact of the programme.
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