TEHRAN –The ministry of education and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) have held a workshop for principals of Upper Secondary Boarding Schools from 10 provinces to boost their capacities in developing students' skills which are essential to find a decent job.

The four-day long workshop was held from April 27 to 30.  A total of 90 Upper Secondary Boarding School principals from 10 provinces of Kordestan, Kermanshah, Hamedan, Ilam, Zanjan, Markazi, Qazvin, Ardebil, West and East Azarbaijan attended the workshop.

UNICEF's collaboration with the ministry of education focuses on adolescents in boarding schools, which are secondary schools in disadvantaged parts of the country.

The training opportunity provides school principals with the necessary knowledge and skills to support the students, at these schools in rural and remote regions, in improving their self-assurance, problem-solving, and teamwork skills.

This series of workshops marks the initial phase that will span across all provinces throughout the year, the UNICEF website announced in a press release on May 9.

Upon finishing the current series of workshops, UNICEF will focus on supporting the Boarding Schools on enhancing students’ access to transferable skills such as digital literacy and entrepreneurship to prepare the adolescents for a smooth transition from learning to earning through alternative learning pathways.

Boarding schools are public schools that serve children from several villages and small towns who do not have access to secondary schools in their vicinity and in some cases homeless children from cities.

Children in these schools usually come from disadvantaged backgrounds and boarding schools are their only venue for access to education.

Students usually live in the school for 5 days of the week and go back to their families for the weekend. Across the country, there are 1019 lower secondary boarding schools serving approximately 130,000 students, and 1155 upper secondary boarding schools serving about 170,000 students.

Well-being programs for youth

Earlier this month, adolescents Well-being and Empowerment Centers, known as MASERRAT, in Mashhad and Kermanshah cities revised and reviewed their protocols to make sure the adolescent girls receive the most efficient and high-quality services.

Adolescent girls aged 10-19 who are participating in well-being and empowerment programs supported by UNICEF will benefit from a significant improvement in the quality of services provided, the UNICEF website reported on May 6.

These changes resulted from a consultative workshop to review and modify the protocols.

The protocols included a wide range of procedures and measures based on which services such as healthy lifestyle, psychological health support, social and life skills, increased meaningful participation, prevention from drug abuse, social harms, and risky behaviors, as well as increased resiliency and self-care.

In November 2023, two pilot programs for the well-being and empowerment of young boys and girls were launched in four provinces of the country.

The Ministry of Sports and Youth and the Drug Control Headquarters in cooperation with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) are implementing these programs in Kermanshah, Alborz, Isfahan, and Khorasan Razavi provinces.

One program is for empowering adolescents and young boys and the other program is for girls' psycho-social health and their empowerment.

Soft and technical skills are taught to boys aged 15 to 24 in three UNICEF-supported centers located in Kermanshah, Alborz, and Isfahan provinces.

The centers provide different services including on-the-job training, internships, mentoring, psycho-social support, counseling, and social entrepreneurship programs.

The focus of this program is to facilitate a smooth transition from learning to earning, empowering 1,618 adolescents and youth in these provinces, the UNICEF website announced in a press release on November 13, 2023.

In the next step, the program will encompass the following provinces: Sistan-Baluchestan, South Khorasan, Khorasan Razavi, Kerman, and Hormozgan.

MT/MG