CIB.O: 10T senior high grads ready for BPO jobs

At least 10 thousand Senior High graduates in Cebu City are likely to get jobs in call centers.

This is the partial count made by Cebu IT-BPM Organization (CIB.O) following its implementation of the Learning English Application for Pinoys (LEAP) program, which is in collaboration with Cebu City government.

CIB.O managing director Wilfredo Sa-a Jr. said call center companies can tap these graduates as they are already capable of handling basic call center jobs.

Sa-a added that while being employed at call center companies, these senior high graduates may also opt to pursue college education.

CIB.O and the Cebu City government are working with 20 public high schools and eight private high schools in Cebu for its LEAP program.

LEAP, a government funded software aimed at improving the oral communication skills of students, is a 40-hour selfbased training program that will be installed in the computer laboratories of schools.

LEAP was piloted in Apas National High School and it is also adapted by other public and private schools from north to south under the City's jurisdiction, such as Mabolo, Banilad, Lahug, Zapatera, among others.

The IT/BPM sector in Cebu currently employs a total of 140 thousand people. Entry level pay of call centers is around P15,000. In the next two years, the sector is seen to need close to 30 thousand new people to accommodate the projected growth of at least 10 percent a year.

So far, CIB.O and the Cebu City government have reached out to these 10 thousand senior high school students before they graduated last March.

The LEAP program is also aided by the City School Board, Department of Education, and Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT).

The Cebu City government targets to hit 200 thousand employment mark in the IT/BPM sector by 2019.