A year of working, a year of becoming: Y.E.S Internships at Good Work Foundation
For many of the young people who come through our campuses, the step from learning into working is the one that carries the most weight. The Youth Employment Service (Y.E.S.) is one of the ways we walk that step alongside our graduates.
What Y.E.S. is
The Youth Employment Service is a private sector led programme that addresses South Africa's youth unemployment crisis through 12 month employment contracts. By partnering with businesses across the country, Y.E.S. creates real work experience for young people and a genuine foothold in the job market.
For our graduates, that twelve month period is a pivotal step. It builds on the foundations of their studies with paid, practical experience, and gives them the chance to develop their skills, sharpen their professional confidence, and grow into the working version of themselves.
Where the academies meet the workplace
Our YES Internships flow directly out of GWF's learning eco-system. Students complete year long programmes across IT, Hospitality, Conservation, Facilitator and our Bridging Year Academy. Course materials are reviewed and refreshed every year so that what our students are learning keeps pace with industry, technology and the global landscape.
When a student completes one of these academies, the YES Internship is an effective way to carry the work forward. GWF acts as a host for our own graduates, placing them in roles across our campuses, and across numerous partner organisations, specifically in the Tourism and ICT sectors across Mpumalanga.
In 2025, 43 GWF graduates entered YES Internship placements. In April 2026, that number grew to 65.
The work of the year
The 2025 cohort took up roles across our campuses and our partner network.
At GWF, interns served as Grade 3 Reading Programme Facilitators, supporting learners across our partner schools with reading development, digital skills, numeracy and literacy learning. They led educational games designed to keep learners engaged, and helped young children encounter the digital world for the first time.
Alongside that classroom work, the year includes workshops in lesson planning, classroom management, occupational health and safety, email etiquette and professional dress code. Skills are developed through doing, and each small success adds to a growing sense of capability and possibility.
Other interns served in operational roles across GWF, supporting daily logistics, transport and the running of our campuses, where the carrying out GWF’s mission depends on dozens of hands working together.
At one of our Tourism Partners, interns fulfilled various Hospitality roles.
A number of our 2025 cohort were hosted at Sabi Sabi Private Game Reserve, working in the Food and Beverage, Kitchen and Housekeeping departments at Selati Camp, Little Bush Camp, Earth Lodge and Bush Lodge. Through this experience, they learned the rhythm of a five star lodge, the art of guest interaction, and the standards of excellence that define the safari industry.
Of these young people, Hugo du Toit, General Manager at Sabi Sabi, wrote that they "received many compliments from guests for [their] friendly, efficient service" and that "it has been a pleasure to assist [them] in growing and developing in [their] chosen field."
The Sabi Sabi Foundation reflected on the partnership in these words:
"Sabi Sabi Private Game Reserve and The Sabi Sabi Foundation are proud to participate in the GWF Hospitality Academy learnership programme. The GWF Hospitality Academy in Hazyview has been producing interns who are work ready, well-spoken in English, enthusiastic and committed to the standards of excellence that Sabi Sabi is known for. We have been exceptionally pleased with the level of quality of the students when they join our lodge, this being testament of the care and passion that they are exposed to while training at campus. It has been an immense pleasure to welcome these students to Sabi Sabi, and we are so pleased that we can assist in providing the necessary workplace skills, in assistance of all to become successful within the 5-star lodging and safari industry."
The partners that make the year possible
A programme like this is the work of many hands. Investec Bank Limited has been a foundational partner in our YES journey, providing 26 placement opportunities for GWF graduates in the 2025 cohort.
The outcomes from that single partnership tell their own story. Of those 26 interns, 13 have already secured permanent positions, with a further seven placements in the final stages of confirmation. The remaining six are completing their internship periods with continued support from GWF's Alumni Programme.
Verena Wagner, Development Manager at GWF, captured the impact in a recent letter to Investec:
"These outcomes reflect strong employer interest and positive candidate performance, and they demonstrate the real, measurable impact of your investment... your investment helps us power our model, deepen employer relationships, and scale opportunities for more young people."
Investec's support sits at the heart of our eco-system of Learning and Working. It creates seamless transitions from learning into employment through workplace experience, mentorship and employer engaged assessment. It validates and strengthens our skills to employment pathways, which in turn inform our programmes and the support we offer learners. And it enables the kind of employer partnerships that expand placement capacity, reinforce on the job learning, and open up career paths for rural youth in Mpumalanga.
Wild Impact is another such partner, providing opportunities for placements for graduating youth. Placement partners include the Seasons in Africa group, Kruger Shalati Luxury Lodge, Hanya House, Graskop Gorge Lift Co and Skukuza Safari Lodge. All key players in making this process possible.
To Investec, Sabi Sabi, and every host partner who took an intern under their wing in 2025, thank you. The year you gave is now woven into the lives, the CVs and the confidence of these young people for good.
A new cohort begins
This April, 65 GWF graduates began their YES Internship year. They have stepped into roles across our campuses, classrooms and partner businesses, ready to put a year's worth of academy training into the rhythm of a working life.
For each of them, this is the year the door really opens. The year of learning the names of colleagues, of being trusted with real responsibility, and of discovering what they are capable of when the work in front of them is the work of the day.
Why this matters
Our "Why" at GWF is to address unemployment by empowering young people with the tools to enter the job market of the future. We believe that connecting a young person to the digital economy changes their life, their family, and their community forever.
The YES Internship is a living expression of that "Why". It is where 13 years of work across six campuses meets the real economy. It is where curricula become careers. And it is where our EcoSystem of Learning and Working delivers on the promise we make to every learner who walks onto a GWF campus, that the work begun here continues into a working life that contributes to the future of South Africa.
To every intern from the 2025 cohort, thank you for the year, the energy and the example you have set for those coming behind you.
To the 2026 cohort, welcome. We are looking forward to walking this year with you.
