Skills for success
Ensuring all young people are ready for their future
When I was growing up, I dreamed of being a park ranger, an author, and even a teacher. We all remember those dreams and ambitions that we had as kids – and we deserve the opportunity to work towards them. When teenagers and young people around the world look towards their future careers, most are hoping for decent, secure, well-paid work, aligned with their skills and interests. Sadly, the COVID-19 pandemic created an economic crisis that threatened career prospects for young people across the globe. Not only did the pandemic lead to a public health crisis, it also reduced the strength of the global economy, and public health restrictions often prevented people working in the informal sector from carrying out their work.
World Youth Skills Day celebrates the importance of equipping young people with the skills they need for employment, decent work, or entrepreneurship. Finding ways for them to realize their dreams. But skills training for specific industries or jobs often overlooks the most critical, foundational skills – literacy and numeracy.
Literacy and numeracy are the building blocks of skills training. Without the ability to read instructions or understand finances, many young people will not be able to realize their dreams of decent work or entrepreneurship. As of 2022, lengthy school closures caused by COVID-19 mean that millions of children have fallen behind in these skills. In low- and middle-income countries, 70% of 10-year-old children are unable to read or understand a simple text, up from 53% before the pandemic.1 These low levels of literacy and numeracy are deeply concerning – and mean that many children are attending school, but are not learning much. Instead, they spend their time in the classroom confused, frustrated, and not grasping the basics. This increases the likelihood of them falling further behind, and never acquiring the skills they need to support their future careers and dreams.
Not enough money to pay and train teachers and outdated teaching techniques are some of the reasons why so many children lack the skills in literacy and numeracy. But this doesn’t mean that young people cannot be supported to learn these skills long after they have left the basic education system and begun their working life.
This is where Save the Children Catch-Up Clubs come in…
In response to the pandemic, Save the Children developed the Catch-Up Clubs model, a short-term, program based on data that has been adapted from the principles of Pratham’s Teaching at the Right Level approach.
Catch-Up Clubs start with short and easy-to-use literacy and numeracy assessments to help instructors understand the specific learning needs of each student. With this information, teachers can create groups in their classrooms based on learning needs (instead of age), and then to deliver level-appropriate activities. Therefore, students are not grouped by age, but rather by their skill level. When the assessment identifies that a student has mastered a skill, they move on to the next level of difficulty.
Although Save the Children’s Catch-Up Clubs are designed for children and young adolescents, the approach to teaching based on their level has been extensively evaluated and has resulted in promising outcomes for older youth too. In Save the Children’s 13-week pilot of the Catch-Up Clubs in Uganda, 73% of children progressed at least one reading level – and by the end of the pilot, six times more children could read with comprehension, in comparison to the number of successful readers at the beginning of the session. This pilot also revealed that the children with the lowest levels of reading made the biggest gains through this approach, clearly demonstrating that it’s never too late to learn and support children and youth in realizing their career dreams.
If career and skill training centres for young people explore these approaches, youth entering the workforce will be equipped with a strong foundation in literacy and numeracy. Today on World Youth Skills Day, we remember how important it is to ensure that every last child and young person has the skills, knowledge, and confidence to achieve their goals and thrive as adults. For every child who dreams of what they want to do when they grow up, literacy and numeracy skills are building blocks to achieving those dreams.
To help us deliver programs like Catch-Up Clubs, to support young people worldwide please donate here
By: Stephanie McBride, Sr. Gender Equality in Education Specialist