PRESENTATION AT JACARANDA HOTEL ON CHALLENGES AND CONSTRAINTS FACING YOUTH POLYTECNICS Youth Polytechnics are basic education institutions intended to offer primary school leavers opportunities to acquire quality skills and knowledge to make them employable while at the same time, providing avenues and paths for attaining higher education through technical and vocational education system. They also equip the youth with technical and entrepreneurial skills based on appropriate technology enabling them unleash their entrepreneurial capacity to fully exploit local community resources for employment creation. KENYAN YOUTH The Kenya National Youth policy defines youth as persons moving from childhood to adulthood aged between 15 and 30 year. This group accounts for about 32% if the population, and forms about 60% of the total active labour force and the largest source of human resource for development. The 15 to 18 year old include primary school leaves numbering 275,000 per year who do not proceed to secondary schools. The 18 years olds include secondary school leavers who though employable have no skills for the job market and therefore remain unemployed. CHALLENGES AND CONSTRAINTS FACING THE YOUTH POLYTECHNIC SECTOR. Lack of a policy framework for youth development generally and management of youth polytechnics specifically. Youth polytechnics are not mainstreamed in the national education and training system. Most youth polytechnics are ill prepared for training, as their physical facilities are run down and equipment are inadequate, absolute or not working. Their programmes do not allow for horizontal and upward mobility and are not market oriented Quality assurance mechanism are lacking in the sector. The image of youth polytechnic is very low since they are perceived as inferior institutions for primary school failures and dropouts Youth polytechnic graduates are not employable because they lack both appropriate skills for employment and they lack resources and entrepreneurial skills to start own business. Majority of students of youth polytechnics graduate before attaining maturity age of 18 years and cannot get employed under the current law. Majority of instructors are inadequately trained or not trained at all in technical trades and pedagogy. Youth polytechnic staffs have no scheme of service and are paid extremely low wages and are not motivated. Most youth polytechnics are poorly funded due to poverty levels in the communities that support them or pay fees for the trainees and lack of government budgetary allocation. The governance in the youth polytechnics is weak because of lack of clear legal institutions framework on which the management committees operate A number of youth polytechnics have no provision for persons with disabilities Most youth polytechnics have no recreational facilities for the youth. Many youth polytechnics lack electricity reliable water supply and access roads. They have not exploited alternative sources of energy. Most YPS have no collaboration or networking arrangements with other institutions nationally or internationally. Sorry for posting the document late. Margaret Gitiiya --------------------------------- You snooze, you lose. Get messages ASAP with AutoCheck in the all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta.