South Africa’s largest importer of automotive batteries, Probe Corporation, has partnered with education and placement centre, eDeaf, to train and provide skills to youth and adults who are hearing-impaired.

The empowerment centre, known as eDeaf – Employ + Empower, offers several training courses and learnership programs to empower and prepare individuals for business. The training courses and learnership programs offered by eDeaf provide practical tools and skills to enable the members of the deaf community to participate in employment and business opportunities.

The training and learnerships that the eDeaf learners are placed on are related to IT, computer literacy certificates, and wholesale and retail certificates.

“Those whose hearing is impaired often struggle to communicate with the hearing world, and are often regarded as incompetent, and not fit for employment. Probe Corporation believes that it is critical to change this perception.

“To this end, we have contributed to the social and economic empowerment of the Deaf community by paying for non-Probe related training courses as well as bringing some learners into our own learnership programmes. Our support amounts to approximately 7 unemployed eDeaf learners per annum,” said the battery and rotating electrics company.