Twenty-two trainees of the Diploma in Civil Engineering Technology (DCET) from RTC-KorPhil Davao were trained on February 24-26, 2025 in Saving and Internal Lending Community (SILC), a program designed to develop discipline in saving and responsible lending.
Introduced by the Catholic Relief Services in TESDA, SILC methodology is a holistic, savings-led microfinance approach teaching the trainees to save religiously and borrow money responsibly, with the group being autonomous and self-managing.
Aside from the savings that will constitute the main fund, the SILC group members also contribute to the so-called social fund which gives a portion of the fund to members having emergencies such as hospitalization, accidents and other circumstances stipulated in their Constitution and By-Laws, hence promoting social cohesion.
After the 3-day training, the DCET trainees formed the third SILC group named “Millioneers”, following the “Agrich” and “Famich” of the Diploma in Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering Technology (DABET) as the first and second SILC groups established in RTC-KorPhil Davao, respectively.
At the training, members of the “Millioners” group committed to save P20 up to P100 individually per week for its first cycle starting this March until the agreed share out date on December 2025.
The maiden SILC group established in the Center, the “Agrich”, composed of 18 members was able to save P62, 175.00 from July 9 to December 9, 2024 and is now working on its second cycle while “Famich” is currently on its first cycle which started November 2024.
