The Dressember Network: Fast Track Vocational Training
As Malala Yousafzai wrote, “When someone takes away your pens you realize quite how important education is.” For so many women who are able to access exit pathways from trafficking situations, particularly in East Asia, this is precisely the situation. Women who escape brothels in East Asia are often unable to finish basic schooling before they are trafficked. As a result, they often lack the personal and professional skills to be economically independent and are therefore vulnerable to revictimization.
A critical part of survivor empowerment is making sure that we help these women access their pens.
One way in which this can be achieved is by tying those pens to the meaningful employment necessary for survivors to provide for themselves and their families after escaping a trafficking situation.
The Dressember Network resources our social enterprise partner’s Fast Track Vocational Training program to equip survivors with vital personal and professional skills to be economically independent and no longer at risk of trafficking. The center operates as a social enterprise jewelry business and seeks to employ survivors in a variety of different job opportunities. The objective of the program is to employ as many survivors as possible and to equip them with the tools they need to have successful careers despite the fact that trafficking prevented them from finishing basic schooling. This involves several hours a week of teaching, counseling, mentoring, and developing specialized vocational skills to use in the social enterprise businesses.
As women develop vocational skills in the social enterprise business supported by this program, they are able to become professional photographers, videographers, accountants, and sourcing managers. All of their efforts support the social enterprise jewelry business, which receives orders across several channels and totals about $1 million in sales per year. Wherever survivors go from the Fast Track Vocational Training program, they will have the skills necessary to work for a growing, fast-paced, and exciting business that serves a vulnerable community.
The Fast Track Vocational Training program offers a wide range of opportunities for education to women who have escaped trafficking situations in East Asia. These opportunities range from basic numeracy and literacy courses that many people learn as children to more complex, business-focused educational opportunities that can empower survivors to pursue meaningful and stable career pathways. The Dressember Network supports this program through the resources and equipment of the fully functional classroom, counseling space, design studio, office, and jewelry production space. What sets this program apart from others like it is that in addition to offering opportunities to access education and job training, it also offers valuable mental health support. This holistic care ensures that survivors are not only empowered to pursue gainful employment but also to find meaning in that employment.
With the COVID-19 pandemic, it is more urgent than ever that survivors be able to access the services provided by our social enterprise partner’s program.
As we can all imagine, it can be difficult to achieve such a wide range of goals in one shared space. The Dressember Network supports efforts to customize the space of the Fast Track Vocational Training program so that it can achieve educational and mental health care outcomes while continuing to run a successful jewelry business that serves the job needs of survivors.
Our social enterprise partner offers services in East Asia, where discussion of human trafficking can be perceived as a political statement. As such, the program does not explicitly state its location or any other identifying factors so that the valuable work of educating about human trafficking and the very real plight of many individuals in East Asia can be discussed without fear of further disruption to the education survivors are finally able to receive. As advocates, one way that we can support survivors in East Asia is by raising awareness and providing people with resources and information that they need to understand human trafficking as both a local and a global issue. It is by raising awareness that we can destigmatize discussion of human trafficking worldwide and begin to ensure that all survivors are able to access the care and tools that they need.
The Dressember Network is made up of 20 organizations that support programs in the following impact areas: advocacy, prevention, intervention, and survivor empowerment. The Dressember Network partners with the Starfish Project to provide survivors of human trafficking with education, mental health services, and job opportunities. The Starfish Project is a jewelry brand that empowers survivors of human trafficking by helping them to access the tools they need to lead an independent and empowered life. When you support Dressember, you help dismantle trafficking holistically and in a way that prioritizes survivor needs and voices. Ready to join us? Register to become an advocate or make a donation today.
About the Author
Miranda Cecil is a second-year at Northeastern University School of Law. She graduated from the University of North Carolina in 2020 (go heels!) and shipped up to Boston. As a North Carolina transplant in New England, she loves exploring her new area on the weekends. In her free time, she enjoys cross-stitching, cycling, and reading. She hopes to use her legal degree and a passion for urban development to continue advocating for human trafficking survivors (and, despite the Boston winter, looks forward to the style challenge this December).