April Raine Lavides

YEP period 2018 - 2020, batch WWX1

Young Expert at WaterWorX - Philippines

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First position after YEP

Project Coordinator/Pro-poor Coordinator at VEI, Philippines

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YEP Role

One of Vitens Evides International’s projects in the Philippines is Performance Enhancement Water Utilities Philippines (PEWUP). The project aims to help the partner water utilities improve and enhance their performance through learning from the Dutch experts and from each other's best practices. The project also aims connect 10, 000 households with affordable and potable water.

 

In regard to the project, my role as the local Young Expert is to assist the Dutch short-term experts that will work with the PEWUP project and the project partners which are four water utilities. I assist the experts with the data they will be needing and at the same time learn from them. Not only the Short-Term Experts but also the project itself. I assist the Local Project Leader, Pro-Poor Coordinator and the Resident Project Manager.

 

As a Young Expert, I gave myself the role of working and learning. Not just from my current work experiences, but also from the different people that I worked and will be working with and apply the knowledge I gained to wherever I am working and will be working in the future. I am open to learning anything that relates not just to water but the environment as a whole. I am also challenging myself to learn about Environmental Sustainability and Preservation through my own efforts and in the future, integrate my Social Work skills with my knowledge about Environment sustainability. 

Click here for more information about my project.

 

Skills

• Community Organising
• Communication and networking skills
• Intercultural communication skills and adaptiveness
• Flexible, Teamplayer

Background

Nationality: Filipino
Education: Graduated Bachelor of Science in Social Work

 

Experience before YEP

• During my Social Work internship, I was able to managed cases of Children in Conflict with the Law, conducted Groupwork to a group of children with behavioral problems, and organized a community and facilitated them in identifying the common problems in their community and helped find solutions to those problems and implement the agreed solutions.
• After I graduated, I worked as a Community Development Assistant in a government agency in the Philippines which is the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). I worked in a project called “Kamustahan Project” where we visited the beneficiaries of a program under DSWD and conducted interviews to know how they are doing and in what ways can the agency improve their program.
• Before the YEP training, I got hired as a Young Expert for one of the VEI projects in the Philippines. I got to work with the different short-term experts from the Netherlands and at the same time learned from them. I was also doing the Inclusiveness Assessment to the partner projects, which are 4 Water Companies.