When learning stops, what happens next?
Through SkillsHub and Edulution Larry is rebuilding his future.
Through SkillsHub and Edulution Larry is rebuilding his future
How many young people are excluded from opportunity before they’ve had a real chance to choose their future?
In Zambia, 97% of young people from the lowest-income households do not complete secondary school. Yet many vocational systems still require the very qualifications thousands never had the chance to earn.
For many, the issue is not potential. It is what happens when life interrupts learning too early - and the pathway back is unclear.
For Larry Banda, that began in childhood.
After losing his father and navigating instability at home, Larry’s education came to an end in Grade 6. Like many young people facing economic pressure, work became the priority long before long-term choices were possible.
He found employment where he could - most recently in construction - but without formal qualifications, opportunities remained limited. Over time, that began to affect more than his circumstances. It affected how he saw himself, and what he believed was still possible.
That began to shift when Larry joined Pestalozzi’s SkillsHub in Zambia.
Through SkillsHub’s partnership with Edulution, learners like Larry are able to rebuild the literacy and numeracy foundations their education never fully allowed them to complete - using self-paced, technology-enabled learning designed specifically for young people whose schooling has been interrupted.
Alongside this, SkillsHub combines vocational training, mindset development, and employer partnerships - creating pathways designed around the realities young people are actually facing.
I used to have low self-esteem. But now, I can see the change slowly.
Larry
That experience reflects something broader. In SkillsHub’s first year, 58.5% of trainees identified mindset development as the most impactful part of their journey - reinforcing an often-overlooked reality in workforce development:
Exclusion shapes more than economic outcomes.
It shapes confidence, aspiration, and whether someone feels ready to engage with opportunity when it finally appears.
Today, Larry is rebuilding both foundational skills and a clearer sense of direction - while beginning to see education and employment not as closed chapters, but as pathways still open to him.
Discover how SkillsHub is creating pathways back into learning, employment, and opportunity.
