By Principal Thembi Tsibogo

The Department of Higher Education, Science and Innovation and other relevant stakeholders celebrate the Technical, Vocational Education and Training (TVET) month annually.

The main aim of celebrating the TVET month in August is to demystify the mind-sets of those that regard TVET College programmes as inferior. The month of August serves to bring awareness to young prospective students who passed Grade 9 as well as those that have completed their Senior Certificate but still not in Employment, Education or Training to seize opportunities of acquiring post-school qualifications offered at TVET Colleges. 

South Africa, every year in August celebrates Women’s Month As a nation, we pay tribute to the more than 20 000 women who marched to the Union Buildings on 9 August 1956 in protest against the extension of Pass Laws to women. 

As we celebrate Women and the TVET Sector in the same month, I wish to invite our prospective young female students and those that are not in employment, education or training to consider enrolling at TVET Colleges. 

Young females are encouraged to be bold enough to participate and enrol in programmes that have always been male dominated. The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic has brought new challenges where we find ourselves in a global digital economy that changes rapidly. For us to adapt to the “new normal”, we require a cadre of young people who should be trained to take up future unknown jobs and be ready to embrace innovation and cognitive technologies of the 4th IR like Artificial Intelligence, Block Chain and Autonomous Mobility (Drones) to name but a few.

As we wish all the women a Happy Women’s Month, we also call upon the South African Citizens to plant the seeds of success in women and children to see real development.  

“There is no greater pillar of stability than a strong, free, and educated woman” 
Angelina Jolie