Printing SA and Boksburg Correctional Facilities have teamed up to ensure that 20 inmates who are due for release later this year will participate in Printing SA’s accredited screen printing training course.
The inmates were selected based on their enthusiasm after participating in a number of various educational campaigns in prison, having completed courses on carpentry, welding and various courses with UNISA.
‘We saw this as an opportunity for our organisation to contribute something meaningful as I realised that after a life of crime, inmates are in a fairly tough position to be employed with a criminal record. When we were approached by the Boksburg prison’s team, we saw this as the perfect opportunity to include our services, which intertwines with some of the skills they have already learned while incarcerated. Overall we need to look at ways of ensuring that when inmates leave, they leave with skills that assist them in contributing positively to society at large and not heading back to a life of crime,’ stated Steve Thobela, Printing SA’s CEO.
The two week course, which spanned from 3-18 April 2017, saw each of the candidates being provided with a startup kit made up of A4 silkscreen, extender, pigments, squeegees as well as canvas, fabric, lino and printing ink, and essential stationary for design patterns.
Once they have completed the course, they will all have an understanding of silk-screen equipment and tools, learn to mix different colours, compile a story board with design ideas and to apply these design ideas onto fabric through various printing techniques. The knowledge of being able to print on cushions with a stencil printing technique, printing a fabric card with a lino printing technique, mixing their own paints to make various colours, learning wax printing techniques as well as printing on T-shirts, will be acquired.
The second week of training constitutes of the basic entrepreneurial skills where they will be taught the following: customer services, professional behaviour, business operations, innovation, creativity, managing resources and marketing management.
On completion, there will be a special graduation ceremony on 19 April where the participating graduates will be issued with their certificates of achievement. Printing SA also invites corporate businesses to join forces with their organisations to grow this programme where candidates can be sponsored.
| LOCAL DISTRIBUTOR PRINTING SA Tel: +27 11 287 1160 Email: info@printingsa.org Website: http://www.printingsa.org  |
