Boys from the Possibility Programme doing leather craft at the skills employment centre on Hope Road in St. Andrew.

Dionne Rose, Staff Reporter

Launched some six years ago as an intervention programme for street boys who wipe windscreens in the Corporate Area, the Possibility Programme has become a lifeline providing 'possibilities' for many of the boys who are now enrolled in the programme.

For 18-year-old Nigel, the programme has turned his life around.

"Up here is a place where me can achieve a goal in life," he told The Gleaner.

While attending high school, Nigel took to the streets because it was financially hardon his parents who had four other children to take care of.

"Sometimes him (his father) don't give me any lunch money, so me haffi stop from school fi two, even three months, and me deh pon the stop light," he said. "Me just tell meself me can't bother live this yah life (on the streets) ... so me go back to me mother and me find meself at this school."

Prospective policeman

Nigel is currently preparing to sit the entrance test to enter the HEART Trust/NTA where he wants to learn a skill. His goal is to become a policeman or a plumber.

"Me want be a police to take care of everybody around the city. Me tired fi see baby and woman get killed," he said.

But for 17-year-old Mark, who has been on the streets since he was 14 years old, the programme has taught him that there is a better life than the stop light.

"It (the programme) help me to do maths well," he said.

In the days he goes to the skills centre and then heads back to the stop light.

Dr. Jaslin Salmon, board chairman of the Possibility Programme, told The Gleaner that Nigel and Mark are among the 20 boys currently learning leather craft, remedial literacy and social skills development at the skills employ-ment centre.

The programme, which targets children and youth, particularly those who wipe windscreens at major intersections in the Corporate Area, also has a care centre which does intake and assessment and referrals. He said boys under 13 years old are reintegrated into the traditional education system or non-traditional system. Boys 13 years and older are sent to the skills employment centre at 4 Hope Road in Half-Way Tree.

Dr. Salmon said that usually after graduation, the programme tries to place the boys in jobs or at HEART Trust for further training.

To date, the programme has taken in 453 boys and has helped to reconnect 42 of them to the traditional educational system. It has taught more than 400 of them a skill, while placing some in jobs.

Dreams of expansion

Dr. Salmon's dream isto have one such centre in all major towns but insists that the public can help by refusing to give the boys at the stop lights money.

"We are looking for mentors because most of them need good examples. We are looking for people who want to volunteer time either at the skills centre or the care centre," he said. "I am saying to the public, join us, help us to help those who need it most."

Names changed

dionne.rose@gleanerjm.com

Clive Spencer (right), participant in the Possibility Programme, and Leroy Campbell, manager of the skills employment centre, show off items made by the boys on the programme. - photos by Norman Grindley/Deputy Chief Photographer

Contact us

The numbers to contact the programme are: 906-3335 (care centre) or 920-3941(skills employment centre).