Activities

AKAZI KANOZE participants work together on a team-building exercise.

Employability Skills Development

The Rwandan Youth Work Readiness Curriculum provides youth with the foundational skills and knowledge necessary to become healthy, productive workers and participants in civic and community affairs. It is participatory, active, and hands-on so that the youth are actively engaged in the learning process, have the opportunity to practice and enhance new skills and gain the self-confidence necessary to find and keep work.

All AKAZI KANOZE participants receive a modular 100-hour work-readiness training course, which includes eight modules:

 

  1. PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT: identifying values and interests, assessing attributes and skills, identifying learning styles and learning strategies, goal setting, planning and tracking progress.
  2. INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION: speaking and listening, following and giving instructions and feedback, forms of communication in the workplace, cooperating/working as a team member, providing good customer service.
  3. WORK HABITS AND CONDUCT: identifying and applying for jobs, interviewing, workplace behaviors and attitudes, time management, balancing work and home life.
  4. LEADERSHIP: characteristics of an effective leader, leadership styles, organizing and motivating others, team building, leading others in problem solving and conflict resolution.
  5. SAFETY AND HEALTH AT WORK: Rwanda health and safety laws and practices, identifying and avoiding hazards in the workplace, responding to emergencies and accidents, basic first aid, healthy lifestyles, stress management.
  6. WORKER AND EMPLOYER RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES: Rwandan labor code, workers' rights, benefits, labor laws.
  7. FINANCIAL LITERACY: managing money, saving, budgeting, how financial institutions work, making financial decisions.
  8. MARKET LITERACY: the cycle of business, entrepreneurship skills, planning for unexpected events, financial record-keeping, marketing, negotiating, adding value to products.

Specialized Training

In addition to the work-readiness training, AKAZI KANOZE offers youth access to a menu of more specialized workforce development skills training and resource programs based on market opportunities and youth interest. Examples of such specialized training courses and services include:

English Instruction; HIV/AIDS Awareness; Hospitality Training; Advanced Entrepreneurship and Business Plan Development; Short Term Specialized Technical Training; Improved Health and Access to Health Services for the Most Vulnerable Youth; Access to Savings and Loans Groups or other topics

Beyond Training

AKAZI KANOZE works with local partners to increase their capacity in linking the program's youth graduates to sustainable livelihood pathways, either through pursuing formal and non formal education and training, or linking with jobs, internships and/or starting small businesses.