Employment
Employing opportunity youngsters in the workforce is a crucial method for them to become involved in their communities. The community as well as the young people themselves gain from their participation in the workforce, especially through apprenticeships.
There are a number of doable tactics that can be used to support opportunity youth despite the complexity of the youth workforce disengagement issue.
The experts on their own experiences are the opportunity youngsters. It is crucial that they are actively involved in the process of attempting to reconnect. For instance, a program called Leaders-Up conducted a conference that was led by young people and that revealed the necessity of building trust and transparency between young people and future employers. On Youth Engaged 4 Change, young people's opinions on this issue can be found.
Many opportunity youth have never worked before. It is crucial that the right training be made available to deal with challenges that arise during the employment application and maintenance processes.
-
Create helpful policies and opportunities together and keep them up-to-date.
It is crucial for programs and employers to collaborate in order to develop chances for young people to enter the workforce. Additionally, retaining support may depend on the review and collecting of data among companies and organizations .
-
Create careers instead of jobs.
Long-term success for that person and possibly future generations of their family and community depends on assisting opportunity youngsters in finding career pathways and preparing them for fulfilling, rewarding professions. For instance, the WIOA Kids Formal Program, which primarily targets young who are not enrolled in school, has 14 program components that must be made available to youth participants.
This can be created in a way that best suits an individual countries. each country has a taste and a click of youth with varied challenges with career and work
-
Eliminate practical obstacles.
Transportation expenses, access to technology so they can take advantage of online opportunities, ensuring they have interview and work-appropriate attire, providing meals, printing hard copies of their resumes, and organizing job fairs so young people can conveniently explore career options in one location are a few examples.
This can be expanded into modules and set in the best way possible to suit individual youth involved.
A program under close supervision of an adult should be developed to help in eliminating obstacles that hinder the youth from exploring their potentials to the fullest.
To make it so easy to work, a smaller group of the youth can used to roll out the the identified program in a pilot stages of the roll out.
The following resources can be used to derive the information needed to sort out the youths and help them with opportunities and introduce them into career paths that will see the light of the day.
Resources
- Strategic Use of Resources, Funding, and Partnerships to Support Disconnected Youth
This case study explains how the Children's Services Council (CSC) was able to apply the lessons learned from earlier initiatives supporting disconnected adolescents to a more comprehensive effort to coordinate financing for this demographic across all county systems and services. In order to optimize the impact on disconnected adolescents, the CSC in South Florida pooled and leveraged different financing sources, as described in this case study.
One of the 14 components of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act of 2014 (WIOA) youth program, supportive services enable a person to engage in WIOA activities. These services allow a person to take part in WIOA events (such as, but not limited to, assistance with transportation, child care, housing, health care, educational testing, and work-related tools).
- WIOA Youth Program Fact Sheet (July 2020)
This fact sheet offers details on the WIOA Youth Program.
- How to be an Opportunity Employer
Employers can find useful information on employer guidelines for dealing with opportunity youngsters on this Grads of Life website.
This Grads of Life document lists the six opportunity employment principles and the talent practices that go along with them.
The U.S. Department of Labor has compiled a list of materials on youth employment. These resources offer data and initiatives aimed at assisting young people establish and maintain ties with the labor market and effectively make the transition to maturity and the workforce.
- Education and Career Toolkit
This engage.youth.gov toolbox is a collection of tools centered on learning and employment. These materials are provided without charge by respected organizations, and are geared at young people. To help youth discover what they need with as few clicks as possible, the resources are also arranged by theme.
Using a mobile-friendly web tool called Get My Future, young people may explore their alternatives for school and training, plan their careers, and look for and apply for jobs.
This program, funded by the U.S. Department of Education, offers interactive tools that provide educators, trainers, employers, and policymakers with information on how to help opportunity kids succeed in their first jobs. A fact sheet also includes this information.
- Opportunity Youth Playbook
The Forum for Youngsters Investment has created a handbook to assist boys and young men of color, who are disproportionately represented among youth with opportunities, in getting back into school or finding work.
- Two Futures: The Economic Case for Keeping Youth on Track
This article goes into length on the problems with youth employment. The report is based on a long-term study that looked at the economic inequalities between young people who remain "on track" and those who don't.
- Resources for Youth Employment Programs
Youth and those who work with them can find materials on this page from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that can aid in laying a strong foundation for their financial futures. On this website, you can find resources for learning about laws and best practices in finance as well as tools for teaching yourself about money.
This paper, created by Civic Enterprises, provides in-depth information as well as a strategy for reuniting one million opportunity youngsters annually using federal funding sources. It describes the American routes that receive federal funding. U.S. Department of Labor and Department of Defense, which could expand to involve more young people, already reconnects about 360,000 young people annually.
