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Summer Youth Programs Heat Up
It’s summer again…if not yet officially, certainly as far as Summer Youth programs go. And now, with a year of recent experience under their belts, Summer Youth program organizers are heading into this season with new ideas and goals of improving upon last year.
The 2009 Scenario
At this time a year ago, there was an air of excitement about the new programs funded by ARRA and Summer Youth was in the forefront with a pressing timeline. The excitement carried with it a justifiable amount of stress from funding that was promised but in some cases not yet present, expectations of creativity, and certain demands for results and measurement that could be interpreted in an assortment of ways. The Summer Youth funding came with various messages. The Employment and Training Administration’s guidance letter was clear in stating that the funding should be spent wisely – in ways that would truly help our youth; and quickly – most of the summer youth funding should be spent by the end of summer 2009. Assembling a great summer program in this timeframe presented quite a challenge, given that the funds really were not available until June.
Quickly and Wisely
Some notable programs chose to focus on the more local aspects of their programs – the parts that only they could do – while relying on proven tools for more global aspects of the program like career readiness preparation and measurement. Among these tools were the National Career Readiness Certificate and Career Ready 101, both highly ranked by the DOL as valuable tools for America’s job seekers. This approach proved valuable for programs in Tennessee and Oklahoma among others.
In order to serve 672 students in 7 counties, Local Workforce Investment Area 12 in Tennessee designed their program in blocks, using Career Ready 101 in the first week and last week with worksite experience concentrated in the middle weeks. Each student was tested with WorkKeys Reading for Information, Applied Mathematics, and Locating Information in order to allow them the opportunity to achieve a National Career Readiness Certificate – which was a key in meeting measurement goals in career readiness as required by ETA.
The State of Oklahoma chose to make use of KeyTrain’s turnkey program, Career Ready 101, to tackle the training piece of their summer programs.
Oklahoma used Career Ready 101 to:
• Plan their program and create a flexible calendar
• Provide Exploration tools for jobs, careers, and industries
• Provide vital life-skills such as financial literacy, resume writing, and interviewing skills
• Help young people make the connection between learning (skill building) and jobs that capture their interest
• Provide accurate measurements showing what skills a young person may be lacking in order to be successful in a specific job
• Assign targeted self-paced lessons to teach skills that may be lacking
• Certify young people with Oklahoma's Career Readiness Certificate
Jason George, Youth Program Coordinator at Oklahoma's Eastern Workforce Investment Board (EWIB) says, "The comprehensive, organized approach of Career Ready 101 gave us a jump start on training and allowed staff to focus on tasks that require local efforts – such as employer relations and community efforts."
Note: Much of this content was presented in our June 3rd webinar: Summer Youth and Credentials: Best Practices in Measurement and Results, which can be viewed in a recorded version at www.keytrainnews.com/summeryouth.htm. Don’t miss our next webinar about the key role of career readiness in Green Jobs – date and time to be announced soon!
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