“Less Gap, More Community” - San Juan Bosco Vocational Training Centre, Cordoba, Argentina

The San Juan Bosco Vocational Training Center of the Salesian Work San Antonio de Padua, a Salesian presence with a great history and reach throughout the population of the popular neighbourhood of San Vicente in the city of Córdoba, has been providing official training courses for 23 years. Based on a deep closeness to the social reality of its community, responding to the needs in order to favor the socio-labor insertion and integral accompaniment of the most vulnerable population.

Currently, training courses are offered in various productive sectors such as residential and industrial electricity, PLC, clothing production and textile mold making, graphic design and technical drawing, baking and pastry making, welding, among others.

This program aligns with "Prevent in order to Care for Life", an Institutional project whose objective is to improve the educational pastoral proposal of the Work with special emphasis on the environmental perspective, providing promotion opportunities for children, adolescents, youth and adults. In the framework of this project, it is worth highlighting that during 2022, the training center added to its training offer the courses of Installer of solar water heaters and Installer of photovoltaic solar energy supply.

Training in digital skills for sustainable textile production is aimed at textile entrepreneurs and aims to provide digital tools and strengthen their production processes under a circular economy paradigm. This initiative is being developed jointly with HILANDA CIVIL ASSOCIATION and PROTAGONISTAS DIGITALES CIVIL ASSOCIATION as part of the "Less Gap, More Community" Program of the Municipality of Córdoba which aims to reduce the digital gap in Córdoba Capital.

More than 100 Cordoban women participate in the training program, who depending on their place of residence, attend different training centers and organizations. The San Juan Bosco Vocational Training Center hosts a group of more than 30 women.

The training program aims to reduce the digital gap in the textile sector of the city of Córdoba, improve production processes and strengthen a multisectoral ecosystem that transforms textile waste into new products. In this way, new opportunities for dignified work are generated for women in vulnerable contexts.

During the course of the program, which will end in June, the participants will go through two training axes: the first one linked to basic digital tools and circular textile production workshops. The second axis will be digital tools for the management of ventures and support in the development of the business model.

The Municipality of Córdoba has been developing important initiatives to guarantee equality of rights and opportunities for different sectors, especially those groups that are in vulnerable contexts. In this framework, the Secretariat of Planning, Modernization and International Relations is the application authority of the "Less Gap, More Community" program created by ordinance in the Deliberative Council of the city and executed through CorLab.

Through this program, the training offers of the centre can be strengthened, promoting the generation of income for those who participate through their association as entrepreneurs, cooperatives, or insertion into companies and organizations.