Banteay Prieb, the Jesuit vocational training centre in Cambodia, has opened a café managed and staffed by young people with intellectual disabilities. The café provides these young people with practical skills that can help earn a living.

The café serves traditional Cambodian coffee and tea, and Khmer breakfast and lunch menus. It also offers typical Italian coffees, such as espresso, Americano, cappuccino and latte, fruit smoothies and juices. It was built with funding support from the Korean Jesuit NGO Joy of Sharing Foundation and inaugurated on July 2.

“We hope that after they finish the Banteay Prieb café training, our students will become more financially independent. After the training they can start a small business to support themselves and their family,” said Phalla Kim, Special Education Programme Manager at Banteay Prieb.

Banteay Prieb (Home of the Dove) began its Special Education Programme in 2015 to help young people with intellectual disabilities who are often at risk of social exclusion. “These are persons who suffer great neglect back home and in their villages,” said Br Noel Oliver SJ, who was part of the original team that set up Banteay Prieb in 1990 to help landmine victims and those affected by polio.

In the years that have followed, the number of people with physical disabilities has greatly declined and a number of the centre’s students now are accident victims. The fewer number of physically disabled students inspired Banteay Prieb to expand its services to helping people with intellectual disabilities.

The Special Education Programme has 14 students whose intellectual disabilities include mental retardation, autism, epilepsy, Down syndrome, spasticity and cerebral palsy. The curriculum combines practical life skills with vocational skills training to help the students become independent and self-reliant.

In the first year, the students learn how to manage on their own activities of daily living, such as bathing, cleaning, washing clothes and using a cellular phone. In their second year, they learn other practical skills such as cooking, agriculture, taking public transportation, shopping for food and groceries and money skills like calculating correct change. In the process, they develop their social skills and become more socially integrated. After they graduate, the students have the option to do one or two years of practicum at the Banteay Prieb café to further develop their self-confidence and self-esteem, learn management skills and how to start up income-generating activities on their own.

The Banteay Prieb staff believes that having the Special Education students run the café demonstrates that people with special needs can lead productive lives and can contribute something of value to the community.

“It’s a great service to these youth who have been really neglected in the past,” said Br Oliver. “Their parents have already seen what their children can do if they are given the right atmosphere and opportunity to grow.”