YOUTH FIND WORK THROUGH FEDERAL PROGRAM
Thursday, August 20th, 2009 -- 11:31 AM
Federal stimulus money has helped put Clark County youth to work this summer.Michael Gaier is serving as a job coach for the Summer Youth Program.
Stimulus monies allowed the program to place a few dozen youth in paying jobs. The employers didn?t have to pay them.
"We were able to slot 35 youths from the ages of 14 to 24 in various work sites," Gaier explains. "ranging from from private to public, non-profit."
The employees worked for eight weeks.
There are obviously a few benefits to the program.
First, the employer gets free labor. The economy is helped as the money circulates. But, the main goal of the Youth Program is to get youth ready for the workforce.
"Our main goal is work readiness. We had 4 job enhancement training sessions. All the kids in the program got a resume, filled out an application by themselves, had budget training," Gaier says.
Gaier says there have been 492 youth employed through the program in the 9-county West Central Workforce Resource, and $256,000 in youth payroll.
The program ends Friday.
Feel free to contact us with questions and/or comments.