By INA SocCom

Sumba, Indonesia, 11 November 2024 -- This activity is themed "Vocational Education in Southwest Sumba towards Golden Indonesia 2045". It was intended as a joint celebration of Don Bosco Vocational School (SMK Don Bosco) Sumba, which has undertaken a project to strengthen the vocational training capacity of Sumba's young people and improve their ability to find employment. Sumba is an island located in Eastern Indonesia, with a population of around 820,000.

This project is supported financially by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the German SDB NGO, Don Bosco Mondo (DBM), for the SDB Congregation (INA), which established the SDB Foundation to serve vocational education in Sumba, namely by opening SMK Don Bosco.

The project started in mid-2021 with the construction of the school building and equipping it with the necessary furniture and equipment. While the building was being constructed, SMK Don Bosco's Staff Development Program had already begun in an effort to achieve the project's objectives. With these two interventions improving the quality of SMK Don Bosco, i.e., having excellent infrastructure and better human resources, the school was successfully selected by the Government to run the Centre of Excellence Program from the Directorate of Vocational High Schools.

Towards the end of the project (December 2024), an Educational Conference was held as a celebration of what has been done and achieved, and at the same time, to launch a road map for ten years ahead - discussed the day before in a Focused Group Discussion by the stakeholders from the Department of Education, Department of Manpower, business and industry players, and other vocational high schools - so that SMK Don Bosco can continue to grow in helping many poor and marginalized young people with an impact on improving collective welfare, and in contributing to "Golden Indonesia" in 2045 (Government goal for one hundred years of Indonesia's Independence Day).

---

---