Eucon offers home care, hospitality training programs

The Eucon International University has joined hands with Taiwan’s Ching Kuo University to offer a hospitality and home care training program that is being touted as a means to address the labor shortage in the Commonwealth.

Eucon University president Dr. Christian Wei introduced the Home Care and Hospitality Professional Training to the public in an opening ceremony last Monday at the Eucon auditorium.

He credited Northern Island Mayor Jerome Aldan and former lawmaker William Torres as the brains behind the idea.

Reps. Alice Igitol (R-Saipan) and John Paul Sablan (R-Saipan), Sens. Frank Cruz (R-Saipan) and Steve Mesngon (R-Rota), and Saipan and Northern Islands Municipal Council chair Luis John Castro and vice chair Diego Kaipat were present to witness the launch.

Mesngon said the hospitality training comes at the right moment, given the workforce struggle the CNMI is facing.

“We appreciate a program like this. It will give us hope that the future of the CNMI is bright through partners that believe and invest in the Commonwealth. Addressing the needs of the Commonwealth and sustaining our economy for the benefit of our residents and visitors is not easy,” he said.

Sablan said, “CKU’s expertise is much needed with our growing infrastructure. It is important that we have our people ready to take on a fast growing economy that cater to both locals and tourists.”

Castro sees home care training as something the CNMI needs, not only for the future but also right now. “We have a lot of elderly people who need your help. In our culture, our elders should be treated with great respect. To have a training that will provide the professional needs of our elderly is greatly desired. This will not only help the local workforce, but the international force as well,” Castro said.

Eucon created its partnership with Ching Kuo University on the two-week program after a process that took nearly three years.

“Dr. Wei came to me three years ago to help establish this training, but I said I was not ready, my team was not ready. But we are ready now, and our number one mission is to serve the CNMI,” said CKU chair Rick Chang.

Chang brought with him his team of five instructors.

His head chef, who will head the hospitality department, is top of the line in Taiwan. He has competed all over the world and has brought back with him awards. He will be joined by a table server and a bartender. CKU’s chairperson of the nursing program will lead the home care department, along with a professor of home care from CKU.

Right now, Eucon has 10 students in the home care department and three in hospitality.

The program already started on Monday, but Eucon is still accepting students.

The program is free for local residents and legal workers. However, there is a $100 deposit fee that Eucon will return when residents compete the program. For international students, there is an $800 fee.