Filipino Mayette G has lived in Rome, Italy for almost 25 years. She is a single mother of three grown children, two of whom are in the Philippines. She is also living testimony of the strength of a programme conceived to empower Filipino migrant workers when they finally return to the Philippines for good.
In 2008, Mayette was one of the first in the eternal city to take the Leadership and Social Entrepreneurship (LSE) Course for migrant Filipino workers. The course is a joint undertaking of the School of Government (ASoG) of the Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines and several civil society organizations in Italy. For the initial course in Rome, ASoG partnered with the Overseas Filipinos’ Society for the Promotion of Economic Security (OFSPES) and Social Enterprise Development Partnerships Inc (SEDPI).
The course integrates lessons in leadership with a bias towards Ignatian spirituality values, social entrepreneurship, and financial literacy. Its main objective is to impart knowledge and skills training in line with these leadership, financial literacy and social entrepreneurship themes. By the end of the course, students will have learnt and practised, firstly, to become positive agents of transformation and servant leaders who contribute towards social value; secondly, to be better able to achieve their financial goals as migrant workers in terms of savings and investments; and finally, for those who wish to become entrepreneurs, some of the values and skills of starting a business with a social value.
Since Mayette took the course eight years ago, she has been able to repay large loans that have been a serious burden on her income and her lack of savings and investments. Despite the difficulties and the conflicts with family members, she has learnt to say “no” to the many financial demands and requests for help from her family, particularly those related to “wants” rather than “needs”. And because she was able to fix her financial goals and her spending patterns, she has been able to save and invest in several productive assets back in her hometown where she plans to retire before she turns 60 years old in five years’ time.
The three young children she left behind in the Philippines have since grown into relatively independent adults who are gainfully employed and now have their own families. What she has been able to learn and continues to learn, she has been able to share with her children.
Mayette has been active with the Family Ministry of the Filipino Catholic Chaplaincy in Rome, where she has served for over 10 years and continues to be involved in efforts to reach out to other migrant parents who are experiencing problems in their relationship with their children, especially those left behind in the Philippines. Her leadership skills have expanded and she has become more assertive in expressing and sharing what she has gained from the course, including organising a financial literacy session in her hometown last year.
Since its launch in 2008, the LSE programme has reached almost 1,200 overseas Filipinos in 14 cities, including Macau, Hong Kong and Singapore as well as cities in the Middle East and Europe. A programme for family members of Overseas Filipino Workers was initiated in the Philippines this year and has been conducted in six cities to date.