AP Residents Focus on their Future with Career Counseling Program

Guest speaker Prasnar Yi from Nokor Group IT

presenting to AP's Career Counseling group

about his work experience in the IT industry

in Cambodia.

Aziza’s Place is in a state of perpetual growth and as the kids get older, and their needs change, new ones arise and we focus our efforts to meet these evolving needs. Recognizing that many of our children were turning 17 this year, we initiated a Career Counseling Program for our 6 eldest residents: Chiev, Chanty, Rotha, Ven, Sreymach and Theara.

The six participants either are or will turn 17 in 2011, but are not necessarily at the right grade in their public school due to their prior experience of attending school only intermittently. Many AP residents were unable to attend public school before living at Aziza’s Place because they were assisting their families by working instead. In lieu of this, many are on different timelines in regards to their graduation, which posed several challenges when designing the program. However, as with everything else at Aziza’s Place, we’ve tailored the focus of the program around meeting the individual needs of each child and the results from the first few meetings have been very positive.

The program currently focuses on encouraging the young adults to begin thinking about their strengths, passions, and interests. With the world at their fingertips, we’re encouraging the students to think outside of the conventional career box and learn about the interesting variety of jobs available to them in present day Cambodia. Reflection exercises, specially tailored individual meetings, and guest speakers from a wide variety of careers and sectors are a few examples of activities within the program. Ultimately, the goal is to ensure the participants gain internship/volunteer experience in several areas of work that interests them within the next year. This will assist them in deciding what to focus on in their post secondary studies.