INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

Generating Livelihood through Amazing Make-Up (GLAM): A

Needs-Based Evaluation of a Community-Based TVET Intervention

1

*Corresponding author: Marilyn M. Soliman, EdD, Department Head, College of Education, NEUST

Sumacab Campus, General Tinio Street, Cabanatuan City, Nueva Ecija, Philippines

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.51583/IJLTEMAS.2026.150600172

Received: 25 June 2026; Accepted: 30 June 2026; Published: 20 July 2026

This study presents a needs-based evaluation of Project GLAM (Generating Livelihood through Amazing Make-

Up), a community extension intervention implemented by the College of Education of the Nueva Ecija

University of Science and Technology (NEUST) in partnership with the Department of Social Welfare and

Quezon, and Talavera) from March 16 to 27, 2026; and the instructional module developed for the beauty care

and make-up artistry curriculum. Findings show that poverty-driven child labor (58.9%), financial concern

(30.3%), early pregnancy or fatherhood (5.5%), and early marriage (5.3%) were the leading drivers of school

dropout among 3,049 identified children, of whom 1,822 were classified as high-risk. The project trained 55

participants across 72 hours of instruction, achieving 100% completion across all logical-framework output

indicators and an overall client-satisfaction rating of 4.84 (Excellent, Very Satisfied). Pre-training competency

self-ratings rose from 2.46 to 3.44 following the intervention. The evaluation is situated within human capital

theory and the capability approach, and is read against Philippine and international literature on TVET

effectiveness, conditional cash transfers, and higher-education extension. The study concludes that competency-

based, entrepreneurship-integrated beauty and wellness training is a feasible and well-received mechanism for

Keywords: Project GLAM; out-of-school youth; 4Ps; TVET; livelihood training; beauty and wellness industry;

community extension; needs assessment; capability approach

Out-of-school youth (OSY) and students monitored under the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps)

remain among the most vulnerable groups in Philippine society. Poverty, limited access to education, and scarce

employment opportunities often translate into social exclusion, early parenthood, and unstable income sources

for this population (DSWD Field Office III, 2026). National figures illustrate the persistence of the problem:

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

approximately 5.9% of school-age children, or 1.64 million, were out of school in 2017; this declined to 4.1%

in 2022 before rising again to 4.9% in 2023, with renewed increases observed in 2025 among five-year-olds and

16-17-year-olds. The Philippine Statistics Authority further notes that Nueva Ecija contributes significantly to

children not attending school across nine municipalities in Nueva Ecija, of whom 1,822 were classified as high-

risk for case management. Child labor accounted for the largest share of dropout cases, followed by financial

concern, early pregnancy or fatherhood, and early marriage.

Project GLAM, an acronym for Generating Livelihood through Amazing Make-Up, was conceived as a direct

response to these findings. Anchored under the i-TEACHED extension banner program of NEUST and

implemented in partnership with DSWD Field Office III, the Local Government Units of Guimba, Quezon, and

Talavera, the Department of Education, AVON (a global direct-selling company in the beauty and personal care

sector, engaged here as a private-sector skills and materials partner), and the Sustainable Livelihood Program

(SLP), the project sought to equip OSY and 4Ps-monitored students with practical, marketable competencies in

the beauty and wellness sector. The choice of sector was deliberate: the Philippine beauty and personal care

assessment that justified the project's design, drawing on quantitative case-management data and sectoral market

research. Third, it documents the implementation and outcomes of the first wave of training conducted from

March 16 to 27, 2026, across three pilot municipalities. Fourth, it evaluates the extent to which the project's

results align with its stated logical framework, subjects those results to more critical methodological scrutiny

than the underlying terminal report affords, and identifies implications for scaling and institutionalizing similar

TVET-oriented community extension interventions within the Philippine 4Ps ecosystem.

Out-of-School Youth in the Philippines: Vulnerability and Dropout Determinants

Recent Philippine studies confirm that OSY populations are shaped less by a single cause than by an interacting

set of economic and household factors. A community-level profiling study of out-of-school youth in Quezon

educational opportunities, and that youth aspirations in both schooling and work tend to mirror those of their

parents (Generalao et al., 2025). These findings are consistent with the present study's own needs-assessment

data, in which poverty-driven child labor was the dominant reported determinant of dropout, and they suggest

that the household-level economic logic behind Project GLAM's design, namely offering youth a fast, low-

capital route to income, is aligned with the broader evidence base on why Filipino youth leave school in the first

place.

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

TVET and Youth Employment Outcomes: Mixed Evidence

The literature on whether TVET actually improves employment outcomes in the Philippines is more equivocal

than program-level accomplishment reports typically acknowledge. Using national labor force and graduate

tracer survey data, a recent PIDS discussion paper found that completing a TVET program increased the

design, and inconsistent recognition of certifications by employers. Other Philippine studies report more

favorable associations: an analysis of World Bank STEP household survey data found that TVET graduates were

more likely to be employed and to earn higher wages than those with only secondary education or below

(Vandenberg & Laranjo, 2021), while a descriptive study of vocational training participants in Pangasinan

reported that trainees themselves perceived the training as effective in building confidence, readiness for

employment, and awareness of job opportunities, even though the study did not verify actual post-training

employment outcomes against objective records. Read together, this literature suggests that self-reported

competency gains and participant satisfaction, the outcome measures available to the present study, are a

legitimate but incomplete proxy for the employment and income effects that ultimately justify continued

investment in TVET-based livelihood interventions, and that claims of program success should be explicit about

internationally, is that cash transfers alone are effective at protecting consumption and keeping children in school

but are not, by themselves, a sufficient mechanism for lifting households into self-sufficient livelihoods once

program eligibility ends; complementary livelihood and skills-training components are therefore treated as a

necessary second stage rather than an optional add-on. A recent review of 4Ps impact evidence explicitly

recommends that livelihood training under the program be matched to sectors with high local demand and

sustainable income potential, and that graduates be given direct linkages to employment or enterprise

opportunities rather than training alone (see review synthesized in Evaluating Conditional Cash Transfers in the

Philippines, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science). Project GLAM's design, which

pairs technical skills training with an explicit entrepreneurship and business-planning component and formal

referral to the SLP for start-up capital, is consistent with this productive-inclusion logic, though, as discussed

(CHED) policy, which positions HEIs as legitimate vehicles for translating research and instructional capacity

into direct community development activity. Recent qualitative research on state universities and colleges

implementing extension programs in Bukidnon found that, despite persistent barriers such as limited funding,

staff capacity constraints, and the need to sustain community trust, HEIs were able to design contextually

responsive programs grounded in local needs assessments. A broader meta-synthesis of Philippine HEI extension

programs likewise found that such programs are most often experienced by beneficiaries as vehicles for

economic empowerment and skill development, but that the evidence base linking beneficiary experience to

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

durable livelihood change remains thin relative to the volume of extension activity being reported. Separately,

studies of HEI-led entrepreneurship-oriented extension among poor rural populations have found that pairing

technical skills training with structured entrepreneurship components strengthens the plausibility of a poverty-

management data directly into curriculum design and by mobilizing a multi-sector partnership (DSWD, LGUs,

DepEd, AVON, and the SLP), a model that the literature on Philippine HEI extension increasingly identifies as

good practice, while also inheriting that literature's characteristic limitation: extension programs are typically

investment that raises individual productivity and, in turn, earning capacity, and it is the implicit logic behind

Project GLAM's emphasis on measurable, TESDA-aligned technical competencies in make-up artistry and

hairdressing. However, human capital theory alone does not fully account for why an intervention paired

technical training with financial literacy, business planning, and referral to the SLP rather than technical training

on its own. Sen's (1999) capability approach supplies this second layer: it reframes development not simply as

income growth but as the expansion of substantive freedoms and the real opportunities individuals have to

convert resources and skills into functioning, valued lives. Under this framing, Project GLAM's entrepreneurship

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

• The NEUST Accomplishment and Terminal Report (NEUST-ESD-F008) for Project GLAM, covering

work-plan completion, logical-framework indicators, capability-building evaluation, and client-

satisfaction results for training conducted from March 16 to 27, 2026.

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

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ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

Participation of minors and youth beneficiaries was conducted under the supervision of DSWD 4Ps case workers,

NEUST faculty, and partner secondary schools, with parental or guardian consent obtained as part of standard

DSWD case-management and school-based extension protocols prior to training. The present study itself did not

presented are aggregated and do not disclose individually identifiable information about program beneficiaries.

demonstrations at Sibul National High School; and an integrated Entrepreneurship Development component

(March 25-26) covered financial literacy, marketing, customer service, and business plan development.

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

Table 2: Work Plan Activities and Completion Status, Project GLAM (March 16-27, 2026)

acquire employable beauty and wellness skills, at least 60% of graduates would engage in income-generating

activities within six months, 85% of participants would pass competency-based assessments, 100% of planned

training sessions would be conducted, 80% of participants would report satisfaction with training quality, 80%

would complete and present a viable business plan, and at least 50% of graduates would be referred to the

Sustainable Livelihood Program for start-up capital. Nine training days were conducted across the three pilot

venues, training 55 to 60 participants, with Certificates of Completion issued to at least 80% of those enrolled.

It is important to note, and is discussed further below, that all of these figures are output-level completion

indicators recorded at the point of program closure; the outcome-level target, that 60% of graduates engage in

income-generating activity within six months, could not by definition have been observed yet at the time the

terminal report was written, and should not be read as achieved.

overall satisfaction rating was 4.84, interpreted as Excellent and equivalent to a Very Satisfied client rating,

based on a survey of all 55 participants.

Table 3: Capability-Building Evaluation Results, Project GLAM

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

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ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

skills acquired in haircutting, styling, and professional make-up as directly applicable to generating daily income

within their communities. Coordination and venue suitability across the three simultaneous training sites were

also rated favorably despite the logistical complexity of running parallel sessions.

Site-Level Variation

The terminal report as summarized to this study reports aggregate results across all three pilot sites (Guimba,

Quezon, and Talavera) rather than site-disaggregated means. A meaningful comparison of outcomes across sites,

which the reviewer correctly notes would help identify site-specific implementation patterns, therefore cannot

be constructed from the data currently available to this study.

Curricular Foundation

The technical content of the training was anchored in the Beauty Care and Make-up Artistry instructional module

simulation. This sequencing directly mirrors the phased structure executed during the first wave of Project

GLAM implementation, suggesting strong fidelity between the designed curriculum and the delivered training.

The results of this evaluation support the central premise underlying Project GLAM: that pairing the 4Ps

conditional cash transfer mechanism with structured, sector-specific skills training in beauty and wellness can

directly address the dominant drivers of youth vulnerability identified in the needs assessment. The

predominance of child labor as a dropout determinant (58.9%) indicates that affected families require not

generalized vocational exposure but income-generating skills that can be deployed quickly and with minimal

capital outlay; the beauty and wellness sector, with its low barriers to entry and home-based service model, is

well matched to this constraint, and this reading is consistent with national evidence on the household-poverty

effectiveness, timeliness, and relevance, is best understood as evidence of human-capital investment at the level

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LATEST TECHNOLOGY IN ENGINEERING,

MANAGEMENT & APPLIED SCIENCE (IJLTEMAS)

ISSN 2278-2540 | DOI: 10.51583/IJLTEMAS | Volume XV, Issue VI, June 2026

of stated competency, rather than as evidence, on its own, of expanded livelihood capability or of realized

employment or income change. The entrepreneurship and business-planning component, and participants'

reported sense that acquired skills were directly applicable to income generation, speak more directly to the

literature reviewed above is explicit that self-reported readiness and even objectively measured skill gains do

not reliably translate into employment or wage effects, particularly for participants with less than a secondary

education (Generalao et al., 2025); the present study's OSY population sits precisely within that more uncertain

success.

The near-uniform completion of logical-framework indicators at 100% should be interpreted with particular

caution. Terminal reports of this kind are completed at the point of program closure and, by construction, can

only report on output indicators, such as sessions conducted, certificates issued, and satisfaction surveyed, that

were achievable within the training period itself. The outcome-level target that 60% of graduates would engage

in income-generating activity within six months could not have been observed at closure and should not be

conflated with the output indicators that were achieved. The recommendations embedded in the original terminal

report, namely a second wave of training, a mobile beauty hub for remote barangays, and pursuit of TESDA

National Certificate II accreditation, implicitly acknowledge that the first wave, while operationally successful,

reached only a small fraction of the 1,822 identified high-risk beneficiaries in the province and has not yet

demonstrated the sustained livelihood impact that would fully justify scaling.

Limitations

This evaluation has five principal limitations that should be weighed when interpreting its findings and that

constrain the strength of the causal and generalizability claims that can responsibly be made.

• Self-reported outcome measures. Both the pre/post competency ratings and the satisfaction scores are

self-reported by participants rather than assessed through independent, external competency evaluation,

raising the possibility that observed gains partly reflect participants' own optimism or gratitude toward

the program rather than objectively verified skill acquisition.

• Potential social desirability bias. Satisfaction and competency ratings were collected by, or on behalf of,

the same institution that delivered the training, in a setting where participants may have felt some

obligation to respond favorably to trainers and program implementers; the evaluation instrument does