Professional training
Sourires d'Enfants helps young Laotians to build their professional future. Our aim is to offer them professional opportunities without encouraging a rural exodus. All the young people we have trained are now working in their villages with a high level of professional qualification.
* 2013-2015: Initial training as a school teacher at the Vientiane teacher training college for 7 girls, all from the villages of Lang Khang. At the end of their two-year course, they were appointed as teachers in our nursery schools. They now work in nursery schools in Lang Khang, Phone and Thong-Kham. Some have management positions.
* 2016-2017: in partnership with the Hospices Civils de Lyon, we organised several training sessions for nurses at the Lang Khang health centre on:
- the management and burning of medical waste (incinerator financed by SDE)
- the correct gestures for prenatal examinations and childbirth
- interpretation of signs such as fever, dizziness, diarrhoea, etc.: first diagnosis, first treatment.
* 2019-2021: support for the training of 10 young girls in dressmaking at the Thakhek technical school. They worked for a year in a sewing centre in Lang Khang, which opened in 2022. They are now independent and have opened their own workshops in their homes.
* 2022-2023: taking charge of the diploma training of 5 young girls in cooking and 4 young men in carpentry and cabinetmaking at the Thakhek technical school.
We also support young people in the villages through shorter, non-degree-granting advanced training courses. For example, two sewing courses were organised in 2023 at the Lang Khang sewing centre.