CIE trade fair aims to provide jobs to indigents

Secondary students from the Centre for International Education recently held a business trade fair aimed at helping economically disadvantaged families liberate from poverty.

The three-day CIE Business Trade Fair held last December 4- 6 at the Ayala Activity Center carried the theme, “Creating Sustainable Innovation for Entrepreneurship” and showcased the student’s skills in business management, information and communication technology, marketing and social entrepreneurship.

Some of the fair’s featured items include: scents and essences, fashion accessories, paper products, bags, pillows, and many more. 

In an interview with Mary Jane Riete of the schools’ Technical Work Ethics, she said that the students’ entrepreneurial endeavor with the economically-disadvantaged families was institutionalized under the school’s Gift of Gold program.

She said that the program has been started last year and a brainchild of CIE founder Professor Nelia Cruz Sarcol and this year was the launching of the student’s product.

Riete explained that the businesses featured in the CIE fair were done by students from the school’s level 11 to 12 and four of these already have beneficiaries while the rest are still learning the skills.

“The students do the marketing of their products down to the financial projections of the businesses. Utilizing the students’ creativity in making products and designing business plans for their beneficiaries is part of our social responsibility as a school,” she said.

The families were chosen by the school accordingly to their skills but Riete discussed that before a particular business would be taken over by the beneficiary, the school would still allot three years of monitoring.

“The students would let go of the business when the family or the beneficiary can already take hold of the business themselves and would already be able to pay back the capital that the students invested because the families should earn the business as well,” Riete added.

With this initiative of helping disadvantaged families alleviate from poverty, the students also espoused the advocacy of the school’s Pearl Principle which states that, “success is measured by the number of people whose lives have improved because of your existence.”

According to Virgilio Paralisan, CIE’s Executive Director for the Pearl Principle “we teach our students that it is in their power to help others and initiate change but they should be aware that it should start from themselves because they have the opportunity to do so.”

Kyle Alo, one of the exhibitors of the fair and sold paper products called Papeterie shared his inputs about the activity saying that, “one of the best ways of learning is by doing. The activity breaks down the four walls of the classroom and expands our horizons allowing us to experience firsthand what it is like to run a business and be tested on how well we deal with people.”