Internship 2026 · CIOP Bamenda
Inside the Internship: Building a Database at CIOP Bamenda
By Let's Talk Tech · August 2026 · 7 min read
The interns with CIOP staff at the Bamenda office.
Three Let's Talk Tech graduates walked into CIOP Bamenda and found five years of client records kept on paper. Two weeks later the organisation had a searchable database, analysed data and a Facebook page.
CIOP is the Community Information and Orientation Program. It guides young people, university students and job seekers towards career opportunities, vocational pathways and further study, and it helps people who have a project but need support and funding to get it moving. Its work covers personal career counselling, scholarship advice and openings for employment and skills training across Cameroon.
What they did at CIOP
3
Interns placed at CIOP
2 weeks
From 12 August 2026
5 years
Of records digitised, 2021 to 2026
6
Sections built into the database
1
Facebook page created for CIOP
3
Recommendations left with the organisation
The first day, and who CIOP serves
Beside the CIOP banner in the office.
Kabi Nora, Nashipu Suniyat and Chifen MaCkelley started on 12 August 2026. Mr Prince ran their orientation and registered them in, and Madam Marie walked them through what CIOP is for, how its departments fit together and the range of people who come through the door.
Dr Eric then took them round the offices to meet each team. By the end of the first day they understood that CIOP serves people looking for work, graduates chasing openings, and people with a project that needs backing.
Everything was on paper
Going through the printed records.
The problem was plain once they looked. Client records, orientations and the opportunities CIOP collects were all catalogued by hand on paper, going back to 2021.
They started by reading through five years of it and moving it into structured Excel sheets under Madam Marie. The hard part was that the format had drifted over the years, so a lot of it had to be interpreted and corrected before it could be trusted.
“Before we arrived, client records, orientations and opportunities were catalogued manually on paper. We digitised the entire workflow.”
Chifen, on what the team found at CIOP
Building the database
Working through the database build.
With the data in order they designed the database around what CIOP actually needs to do each day. It ended up with six sections: admin and user management, departments, staff information, staff sign-in and sign-out, workshop information, and a way to keep updating the records already collected.
They also worked out how it could eventually talk to CIOP's website, so that information entered once does not have to be entered again somewhere else.
Five years of data, run through SPSS
A working session at CIOP.
Once enough of it was entered they exported the data into SPSS and started analysing it properly, asking how many people CIOP's activities had actually reached and how that broke down by gender.
That is the point at which an archive becomes useful. An organisation that can count who it has helped, and say so, is in a different position when it goes looking for funding or reports on its year.
A logo, a flyer, and a Facebook page from nothing
In the second week they turned to how CIOP looks from outside. They recreated the organisation's logo, designed a flyer for an upcoming workshop and kept producing promotional material for activities still to come. With the Director's approval they created a Facebook page for CIOP and started posting opportunities and organisational news to it, then planned a LinkedIn page and further work on the website.
They also sat in on a CIOP workshop called Choosing a Career and Not a Course, run by Madam Roseline and Mr Prince, and watched how the organisation handles a room of young people deciding what to do next. The work split naturally between them: Kabi Nora took the data analysis, Nashipu Suniyat the flyer design and communications, and Chifen MaCkelley the website and database development.
What they left behind
They did not only hand over files. The team closed their report with three recommendations for CIOP: keep a steady presence on Facebook and LinkedIn so more people hear about what is on offer, install a reliable Wi-Fi connection, and put the opportunities collected from newspapers and elsewhere into the computer every month so they can be retrieved and totalled at the end of a year.
The work is not finished and they said so. The remaining analysis, the graphs, further database improvements based on staff feedback and the LinkedIn page are all on their own list of next steps. What they proved in two weeks is that an organisation running on paper can be moved onto something searchable by three people who know what they are doing.
Questions about this placement
What is CIOP Bamenda?
The Community Information and Orientation Program, based in Bamenda. It is an orientation, counselling and empowerment organisation that guides young people, students and job seekers towards careers, vocational training and scholarships, and supports people whose projects need backing.
What did the interns actually build?
A database with six sections covering admin and users, departments, staff, staff sign-in and sign-out, workshops and record updates; five years of paper records moved into structured Excel and analysed in SPSS; a recreated CIOP logo and a workshop flyer; and a Facebook page created from nothing and populated with opportunities.
How do I join the next Let's Talk Tech cohort?
Get in touch with the Let's Talk Tech team through the contact page. Every cohort ends with a two-week placement inside a local organisation, like this one.
Let's Talk Tech Internship 2026
Read the other placements
Nine groups of Let's Talk Tech graduates spent two weeks inside local organisations in August 2026. Each group wrote up what they did.
With thanks
Thank you, CIOP Bamenda
Our thanks to CIOP Bamenda for opening its doors to three of our trainees, and to Mr Prince, Madam Marie, Dr Eric and Madam Roseline for giving them real work and real responsibility rather than a seat in the corner. A placement only teaches anything when the host is willing to make room, answer questions and let people get things wrong on the way to getting them right. We are grateful they did.
