Job orientation and interviews at a footwear factory

Care in Action regularly facilitates job orientation programmes, where we provide teens in care with insight and skills necessary for a successful start in the working world. We train teens in how to handle bank accounts and access other vital services, like how to rent a room, how to get set up with a utility provider, and importantly, how to perform in a job interview and get a head start with career work experience.

After teaching the ins and outs of how to nail a job interview, we took 14 teens to test their newly developed skills at a partner company that makes footwear. Sika company managers conducted a series of mock interviews to give the teens some real life experience in presenting themselves and making a positive impression on potential employers.

The teens then got a tour of the company and a glimpse into the everyday working life of the employees. To round off the experience and help release any interview nerves, we took the teens for a fun game of laser tag.

Many children in institutional care have to leave and survive in the real world at ages 15-17. They’re given about €20 a month to life on. This is an impossibly daunting reality for kids who often grow up with little to no knowledge of career options and working life. As a result most turn to crime, begging, prostitution, drugs, or even suicide when survival becomes too difficult.

But we know experiences like these can help build a bridge from the point of leaving care to when orphans have to stand on their own feet.

If you would like to help sponsor more job orientation and lifeskills coaching for Ukrainian youth, or help fund an apprenticeship or University degree for an orphan, please get in touch.

This short film shows how teenagers in care are gaining work skills at a textile factory.