December 14th, 2020 – Toronto, Canada – Prepr is excited to announce a new partnership with The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization enabling mass innovation through open source, that will give work-integrated learning experiences to youth facing employment barriers. The new initiative, the Flexible Upskilling Network (F.U.N.
) program, launches in collaboration with the Magnet Network and the Network for the Advancement of Black Communities (NABC). The F.U.N. program is a blended learning program, where participants receive opportunities to combine valuable work experience with digital skill development over a 16-week journey. The objective of the F.U.N. program is to support youth, with a focus on women and visible minority groups who are involuntarily not in employment, education, or training (NEET) in Ontario, by helping them gain employability skills, including soft skills like communication, collaboration, and problem-solving.
Caitlin McDonough, Chief Education Officer at Prepr, says about the F.U.N. program, “Digital skills are essential for the workforce of the future. We at Prepr, are looking forward to the opportunity to support youth capacity development for the future of work.”
With The Linux Foundation, Prepr is committed to supporting over 180 youth participants enrolling and completing the F.U.N program between July 2020 and March 2021. Prepr will be using its signature PIE ® method to train the participants in Project Leadership, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship to expose them to real-world business challenges. The work-integrated learning experience Prepr provides will support participants in developing both soft and hard skills, with a focus on digital skills to help them secure gainful employment for the uncertain future of work.
“In this day and age, it is essential to have a good educational foundation in technology to maximize your chances of career success,” said Clyde Seepersad, SVP and GM, Training & Certification at The Linux Foundation. “We are thrilled to partner with Prepr to bring The Linux Foundation’s vendor-neutral, expert training in the open source technologies that serve as the backbone of modern technologies to communities that will truly benefit from it. I look forward to seeing how these promising students perform and hope to partner with Prepr on future initiatives to train even more in the future.”
The program will explore digital career pathways through multiple work-related challenges. These work challenges will bring creative approaches to gaining innovative skills that are invaluable in today’s new normal of remote work and learn while allowing individuals to become more competitive in today’s digital workforce.
Stephen Crawford, MPP for Oakville, speaking about the government’s commitment to supporting youth facing employment barriers: “This government is committed to supporting our youth, notably visible minorities, as they prepare to enter the workforce. The youth of today will be the leaders of tomorrow.” The Ontario government funding for the F.U.N. program is part of a $37 million investment in training initiatives across the province.
Through the program’s blended learning approach, participants will learn how to use Prepr’s signature PIE ® tool, which addresses three essential skills gaps facing the business services sector today: expertise in innovation, project management, and business development (entrepreneurship, sales, and commercialization). At the end of the program, participants will gain a certification, along with 12 weeks of hands-on work experience, which will foster valuable, future-proof skills to secure gainful employment.
The Linux Foundation will also support participants through an introductory course to Linux and related tools: LFS101x: Introduction to Linux. The program will help to develop the digital skills essential for our new normal of work, with beginner-level challenges to fill obvious skills gaps and foster a mentality of problem-solving. With the support of open Linux Foundation resources, these challenges will be an opportunity for participants to ideate and create project solutions ready for real-world implementation.
About Prepr
Prepr provides the tools, resources, and technology to empower individuals to become lifelong problem solvers. Through triangular cooperation between the public and private sectors as well as government, Prepr aims to strengthen the collaboration on challenges that affect individuals, communities, businesses, and infrastructure to create a more sustainable future for everyone.
About The Linux Foundation
Founded in 2000, the Linux Foundation is supported by more than 1,000 members and is the world’s leading home for collaboration on open source software, open standards, open data, and open hardware. Linux Foundation’s projects are critical to the world’s infrastructure including Linux, Kubernetes, Node.js, and more. The Linux Foundation’s methodology focuses on leveraging best practices and addressing the needs of contributors, users, and solution providers to create sustainable models for open collaboration. For more information, please visit us at linuxfoundation.org.
The Linux Foundation has registered trademarks and uses trademarks. For a list of trademarks of The Linux Foundation, please see its trademark usage page: www.linuxfoundation.org/trademark-usage. Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.
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