GOVERNOR DEVAL PATRICK
WESTFIELD – Governor Deval Patrick joined Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development Rachel Kaprielian, local elected officials, youth job advocates and a number of young people to announce $8 million in state funding for the YouthWorks Summer Jobs Program. The subsidized program is expected to put 4,000 at-risk teens and young adults to work in summer camps, daycare centers, cities and towns, non-profits, state agencies and private sector firms to gain valuable work experience, which can build stronger and safer communities.
“These jobs are essential to providing our Commonwealth’s at-risk youth with a better opportunity for a brighter future, while creating safer communities across the Commonwealth,” said Patrick. “The program offers our youth career skills and a roadmap for using those skills to build a strong foundation for their future.”
This funding underscores the Patrick administration’s continued investment in the YouthWorks Program, a summer jobs program that provides subsidized employment to low-income and at-risk youth ages 14-21 in 31 communities across the Commonwealth. These employment opportunities provide youth with job experience, beneficial career skills and a chance to give back to their communities. Since Patrick took office, the YouthWorks program has grown from $4.7 million in the summer of 2007 to $10 million in the summer of 2013.
For Westfield, this is YouthWorks’ third summer of connecting local youth and businesses.
“So many kids want to work,” said Kathryn Kirby, a youth employment manager for the Regional Employment Board of Hampden County. “But in recent years they’ve started losing job opportunities by having to compete with older workers.”
Just under $1.2 million of the state’s funding for YouthWorks will be coming to the four city bracket of Springfield, Holyoke, Westfield and Chicopee. That money will support the over 620 low-income and at-risk youths in those cities that will be a part of the program. Currently, Westfield is looking at just under $80,000 of that funding and 43 youth signed up.
Though YouthWorks is paying for the part-time positions of youth over the summer, the program is designed to encourage businesses to consider hiring young adults on their own. It also serves to help youth understand the modern, working world and how to more efficiently pursue careers that they want to succeed in.
Kirby also went into YouthWorks’ year-round program that 20 kids are presently a part of, all employed in a variety local businesses, such as restaurants and office and community work.
“The work experience is fantastic for youth,” said Kirby. “We’re able to put them to work for months and, during that time, help teach them soft skills such as how to manage your time, work etiquette and think critically and competitively, abilities that are needed in the work force.”
The Commonwealth Corporation administers the YouthWorks Program under the direction of the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development to local workforce investment boards. Programs across the state will begin June 1, 2014 and run until September.
