“We were creating a Cebu city youth alliance for out-of-school youth and it was difficult to start something if you don’t have a background, or data on the population that you are trying to serve. So one of our resources at that time was the DSWD, who provided us with Listahanan, and so, with the idea of number of out-of-school youth per barangay in Cebu City, we were able to see which barangays had many out-of-school youths,” recalled Marione Josue I. Bacalso, Youth Development Coordinator of Cebu City of USAID Opportunity 2.0 Program.

“Listahanan data gave us an idea where to start,” said Marione Josue I. Bacalso Youth Development Coordinator – Cebu City USAID Opportunity 2.0 Program.

The Cebu City youth alliance is composed of different private, government, academe and non-government agencies that have services for out-of-school youth. USAID, as one of the partner agencies, used Listahanan 2 data for their planning purposes.

Opportunity 2.0 program is a five-year (2020-2025) USAID-funded project that aims to improve education, employment, and livelihood outcomes for vulnerable out-of-school youth.

Mr. Bacalso said that the Listahanan data gave them an idea of where to start. “It serves as an eye opener for us and, I guess, for our partner agencies as well.” It helped them come up with questions like why this barangay has a lot of out-of-school youth. “It was a good way for us to start a conversation in the alliance.”

DSWD is part of the alliance with Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) together with more than 20 other partner agencies. “I think that’s one of the things nga makacontribute gyud si (that DSWD can contribute) DSWD because you have such a program for collecting data.

Bacalso hopes that with the upcoming Listahanan 3 data, the DSWD will share it with the alliance so that other members and other organizations will be informed and updated as well. He said, “It would help us with our directions for planning and would help us to know what interventions to give and where to give them.”

With this data they can focus on what needs to be done instead of giving just anything that might not be useful. It’s not a guessing game for us. We become strategic in planning and in the implementations of our plans,” said Bacalso. ###

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