The Western Cape Minister of Social Development, Albert Fritz, launched the province’s fifth Youth Café in Vrygrond, Cape Town today.
The Sozo Youth Café is the culmination of the partnership between the Western Cape Department of Social Development and our Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) partners, the Sozo Foundation.
Youth Cafés are an initiative borne out of the provincial Youth Development Strategy, and the Western Cape Governments new Provincial Strategic Goals, specifically Strategic Goal 2- which calls for improving education outcomes and opportunities for youth development.
The Sozo Youth Café is a space which puts youth on a path toward creating opportunities not only for themselves, but for others too.
The Sozo Youth Café will offer youth of Vrygrond a 6 months programme, which will address the holistic development of young people. Defined as the “1-4-1 model”, the programme will entail;
- One month of lifeskills, mentoring, heartlife courses (social work interventions), and skills training sessions.
- Four months of skills training offered in four streams, the barista & catering stream, technical skills stream, digital stream, and entrepreneurial stream.
- One month of job readiness and exit preparation, in which youth participants will be assisted with CV writing, job shadowing, interview skills, and ongoing one-on-one mentoring.
As with all other Youth Cafés, high-speed internet access is available for job seekers or entrepreneurs to use in search of further opportunities. This space will play the pivotal role of providing a socially inclusive and enabling environment for youth in Vrygrond and the Southern suburbs at large.
Like the Youth Cafés in Mitchells Plain, Athlone, George, and Oudtshoorn, youth must firstly register to participate in activities that earn the Youth Café virtual currency, called ‘Zlato’. The currency can then be used to access services, training sessions and, of course, coffee and lunch from the café.
In his address, Minister Fritz thanked the Sozo Foundation for partnering with the department, “this is testament to the power of working in a whole-of-society manner. With limited budgets we can only go so far alone as government. but with partnerships with
Non-Governmental Organisation (NGOs) and the private sector, we can act together to provide opportunity for our youth.”
We will continue expanding opportunity for young people, by building partnerships with NGOs and the private sector. The empowerment of youth can best be achieved, ‘Better Together’.
Media enquiries:
Minister Albert Fritz
Cell: 083 307 0192
Sihle Ngobese
Tel: 021 483 9217
Cell: 076 083 6543
E-mail: Sihle.Ngobese@westerncape.gov.za
