Students from Mindanao maritime training colleges are giving their careers an early boost with the help of a U.S. government-funded language project that strengthens their job-related English skills before graduation.
“Filipinos are leaders in the maritime field, so it’s important to build up our ability to communicate,” said Robert Quinto, a Davao-based manufacturer and former chamber of commerce president. “The earlier, the better. English is learned by being used, and that takes time.”
Through the Job Enabling English Proficiency (JEEP) Project implemented by USAID’s Growth with Equity in Mindanao (GEM) Program, these students learn, among things, to field job interviews with global shipping companies and to deal with workplace problems in English through simulation exercises.
“It gives them confidence, which makes them more marketable after graduation,” said Lorenzo Edwin Eusebio, president of the Davao Merchant Marine Academy (DMMA)-College of the Southern Philippines.
“Worldwide, there’s a need for thirty to fifty thousand merchant marine officers,” said Atty. Casimiro Juarez, Jr, president of Capitol University in Cagayan de Oro. “But to get on this career track, you have to be able to communicate well.”
DMMA and Capitol University are among the 27 colleges and universities in the region, both public and private, that are partnering with the GEM Program to provide JEEP.
The training focuses on English for specific job sectors, such as marine services, travel and tourism, nursing, and allied health services. Most of these sectors require applicants to pass an English language proficiency examination before they can be hired.
DMMA has just established a second dedicated speech laboratory with additional computers, bringing its total investment in JEEP to more than two million pesos.
“We think our investment will pay off in greater employment opportunities for our graduates,” Eusebio said.
The college, which also offers degrees in hotel and restaurant management, nursing and other disciplines, has now made JEEP mandatory for all students, and incorporated it into the curriculum.
The GEM Program pays the costs of a server and of software licenses for the first year of the program, and provides teacher training and educational materials.
The training begins with a year of computer-assisted instruction and classroom activities focusing on General English language skills, known as JEEP-Start. The second year of training, JEEP-Accelerate, focuses on English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and includes Internet-based study, group work, improvised conversations revolving around typical job situations, and written exercises.
JEEP students are also provided with videos of themselves taken during simulated hiring interviews as part of the JEEP course of instruction.
The focus of the project, which is implemented under the oversight of the Mindanao Development Authority, is on results: substantial gains in English proficiency leading to a greater number of Mindanao graduates obtaining well-paying jobs.
“The trend in the maritime industry is to seek out promising students who would make skilled marine officers,” Eusebio said. “About four hundred of our marine cadets are on scholarships established by European, Japanese and U.S. companies, and they appreciate the degree to which JEEP has enhanced these cadets’ skills.”
A number of these companies have provided suggestions on how to strengthen JEEP for the maritime services sector, which the GEM Program has incorporated into the training curriculum.
Over the course of their training, marine cadets become markedly more outgoing and at ease using a foreign language, observed Professor Jee Gica, the JEEP Coordinator at DMMA.
“Even if their English is still not perfect, this confidence opens them to continue absorbing knowledge after they’ve left school,” Gica said. “Students who’ve graduated have told me that JEEP role-playing exercises helped them deal with real-life work situations.”
More than 23,000 students have been enrolled in either JEEP Start or JEEP-Accelerate instruction since the project began in 2009. In the 2011-12 academic year, more than 15,000 students in Mindanao will be enrolled in JEEP at any given time. [GEM]
