The lack of successful engineering graduates coupled with the lack of opportunities and funding for talented youth from rural areas, have been a concern to the engineering sector for some time. With this in mind, the Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA) has endorsed the development of the ‘South African Youth into Engineering Programme’ (SAYEP) and called on the engineering industry to support this initiative by sponsoring and mentoring of students through the programme.

“The primary objective of SAYEP is to recruit potential engineering students from the rural areas where poor high school performance, often due to inadequate facilities, has impacted on the student’s ability to secure access to tertiary education and to be able to pursue their engineering studies successfully,” says Dr. Oswald Franks, CEO of ECSA. “However, while ECSA supports this initiative wholeheartedly, it cannot succeed on this endorsement alone, and I ask the players within the engineering sectors to come to the table and participate in some of the academic support initiatives that will be offered.”

ECSA believes that the programme will provide constructive assistance to students on their journey to graduating as qualified engineers. SAYEP will focus on the civil, mechanical, industrial and chemical engineering disciplines and will be piloted in partnership with the Manufacturing, Engineering and Related Services seta (MERSETA).

The SAYEP bursary scheme will operate differently to other mainstream bursaries with a holistic support strategy in place which includes:

* Academic support.

Historically students have been overlooked by university and industry recruitment programmes due to poor scholastic results and mediocre performance; with some that have managed to obtain a university placement and dropping out due to financial issues or lack of adequate support. The current shortage of qualified engineers in South Africa has reached an unacceptable level at a time when such skills are in great demand by industry, therefore there is a dire need for a programme such as SAYEP to assist in the recruitment, mentoring and development of students through their tertiary engineering years.

Franks concludes that the SAYEP programme has the ability to turn around the current high drop out rate within our engineering faculties which has exacerbated the high unemployment rate among the youth.

For more information contact Dr. Oswald Franks, ECSA, +27 (0)11 607 9539, ceo@ecsa.co.za, www.ecsa.co.za