COTABATO CITY, Philippines—Two Muslim women are among the 15 students from conflict-affected areas of Mindanao getting financial support from the USAID’s Growth with Equity in Mindanao (GEM) Program.
L-R: USAID-GEM scholars Jamil Matanog, Samer Makalilay, Musarapa Insiang and Haiza Pigkaula.
Once they pass the licensure examination, the two, Musarapa Insiang and Haiza Pigkaulan, will be among the first Mindanao Muslim women mining engineers in the Philippines. Both women will graduate in 2012.
“This scholarship will give me the chance to have a good career in a growing industry, and in my home region,” said Insiang, who grew up in a rural community in Datu Paglas, Maguindanao.
The financial support is provided through the Investments in Vocational / Elementary / Secondary and Tertiary Studies (INVESTS) project being implemented by USAID’s GEM Program, through its workforce preparation component.
Through INVESTS, the GEM Program is helping to provide selected students—all of whom are all from under-represented communities in conflict-affected areas of Mindanao—with the qualifications to secure professional employment in selected rapidly expanding industry subsectors, such as computer-based animation and mining.
The INVESTS mining students are enrolled in Palawan State University, the University of the Philippines in Diliman, and the Cebu Institute of Technology, nine of whose graduates were among the top 10 performers on the 2008 government licensure examinations for mining engineers.
“We have taken courses in environmental science and mining law, in addition to mineralogy and principles of mining,” said Haiza Pigkaulan, a scholar from Columbio, Sultan Kudarat, now studying in Palawan State University.
“There are mining operations in our community, and I want to work in Mindanao rather than abroad, and with an environmentally responsible company,” Pigkaulan said.
Mining is a relatively unknown academic field in the Philippines, and the few colleges that offer the subject produce approximately two dozen licensed mining engineers annually, while the rapidly expanding industry requires at least a hundred per year.
Other workforce preparation projects that have provided vital career skills and opportunities to Muslim women and other young people in Mindanao include USAID-GEM’s Job Enabling English Proficiency (JEEP) Project, which enhances industry-related English language skills of college students in 26 partner universities, to help them compete successfully for jobs in high-growth sectors.
Another related USAID-GEM initiative is the Productive Internships in Dynamic Enterprises (PRIDE) project, which partners with corporations to provide managerial and technical internships, of three to six months’ duration, for qualified recent college graduates from conflict-affected areas, including the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao.