Respond to two of your colleagues’ postings in one or more of the following ways:
• Suggest one alternative contribution that advocates and/or consultants could make towards addressing the social problem that they discussed.
• Provide one insight that you had or conclusion that you drew about how advocates and/or consultants further social change in the human services profession.
SHELLON
Social problem
The social problem I choose for my final project is the implementation of Technical and Vocational Educational and Training (TVET) in low-income communities in Guyana, South America. TVET programs aim to reduce educational inequality by addressing the multifaceted needs of low-income children and youth (Galindo, 2017).
Roles of Advocates and Consultants/ Similarities and Differences
By definition, advocates do more than one of the following: (1) speaks on behalf of; (2) make recommendations; (3) support or defend, (4) argue for a cause; and (5) plead on behalf of others (Alliance for Justice, n.d.). On the other hand, the engagement of consultants varies by foundations type and is used to help support various aspects of work, such as (1) providing expertise in technology; (2) helping with communications and marketing; and (3) helping with evaluation (McGill, 2015).
The use of consultants in communication and marketing will be utilized because of the diversity of Guyana ethnic groups, which includes Indo and Indigenous Guyanese and Afro and Mixed Guyanese within the communities (Constantine, 2022). Advocacy in organizing, a legislator on education issues, training, public education, and educational networking will be the main focus since the social program addresses the lack of TVET programs in schools. In the beginning, the primary focus of advocacy will be educating the public about the social issue to identify and engage the key stakeholders. Identifying individuals to gather information such as the history of the current situation (Stroh, 2015) will help build an understanding of the current reality of the social problem.
