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| P.O.Box 86620 Portland,Oregon 97286 phone:503-943-2228 fax:503-281-4216 | ||
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News Archive: Pathways Program OT Celebrates First Graduation for Tradeswomen-To-Be OTN Receives WANTO Grant from USDOL Future Tradeswomen Begin Their Pathway to Success Preparing for Success: Class Offers Career Skills OT Celebrates First Graduation for Tradeswomen-To-Be Many future tradeswomen have found their start through the Pathways to Success program, but the new 13 week class format allows OT to certify that participants have completed the program. Wednesday, March 26, OT celebrated the first graduating class. Here are the thoughts of Pathways students as they became graduates: Donna: “I was looking for something that would give me a good wage. Was a single parent raising my children on a $9.00 job. OTI has changed my life. It helped me learn about and narrow down the possibilities. I am interested in a career in water works. I have received certification as a Backflow Tester.... I can now make a decent living for myself and my children. I am off any public financial assistance.” Amber: “OTI has given me a direction and helped me find ways to use my skills and interests as a carpenter...I want to stay involved with OTI as a member of support group and as a volunteer.” Isabell: “This is the first time I have been with women working together. Having all women in the room working together and giving support to each other has been very special. I have learned about myself....The support and resource information has helped me know where to go to get the classes I need and has given me the confidence to do this”. Cameron: “OTI has helped me ‘get back on track’ in my life and given me information to help me decide whether to return to my previous career in corrections, or to move into a trade.” Lauren: “When I attended the information session for OTI I was at the lowest period in my life...I had been an at-home mom for many years. I thought nobody would want me as an employee!...What I gained through OTI was information, confidence, self-esteem, and friends....Now I have future. I have applied to the Operating Engineers apprenticeship and am very excited about a career in this field.” Sarah: “I came into the program with 18 years experience as a Building Maint. Engineer. Being here I gained confidence, skills for working with others. I recently had my interview for the Floor Covers apprenticeship, and I felt confident being interviewed by 13 men! I have gained many new math skills attending the OTI math sessions.” Rebecca: “I came in feeling like a loser who would never get a job....I learned so much about my skills, abilities, and strengths by producing a Trades Resume....I have applied to the Sheetmetal Workers Apprenticeship program and am very very excited about a career as a sheetmetal worker.” Connie: “I gained support and friends. I learned to be organized and set goals and work on them in little steps....I have applied to the Heavy Equipment Operators apprenticeship. I really want it and should hear soon” Congratulations Pathways to Success graduates! Keep in touch. April, 2003
OTN Receives WANTO Grant from USDOL We are thrilled to announce that we have been awarded a Women in Apprenticeship and Nontraditional Occupations Grant from the US Deprtment of Labor. This grant will enable OTN to assist businesses and labor unions to increase the number of women in nontraditional jobs. Our project, titled “Portland Pathways to Success” will increase the participation and retention of lower-income women from the Portland/Multnomah County Enterprise Community (PMEC - the North/Northeast corridor including St Johns) and Metro Portland Region in sustainable, family-wage jobs. The target population is PMEC women returning to work after welfare and other long-term work disruptions. Technical assistance that will help unions and employers outreach to potential women workers, develop retention systems and linkages to needed support services is a major focus of this grant. It will be developed and provided by a Project Manager that OTN will be adding to our staff in the near future. Through a contract with Steps-to-Success, a Portland Community College Welfare-to-Work Program, the project will have a Job Developer dedicated to recruitment, screening, placement and individual coaching for potential tradeswomen. The grant also pays for research by Dr. Barbara Byrd of the Labor, Education
and Research Center into why women drop-out or succeed, with training in
best practices to be developed from the findings of the research. Another
important segment of the grant will develop a “ready-to-earn” fund
to help participants pay for tools, tuition, transportation, childcare,
and other start-up needs.
Future Tradeswomen Begin Their Pathway to Success On April 12, the first class of OTN’s Pathway to Success Project starts! The five week class will prepare women for an entry level job that leads to apprenticeship. Training will prepare women mentally, physically and spiritually for the stresses of a trades job. Women work with Project Manager Donna Hammond and Job Developer Rhonda Lund to assess their readyness and choose one of three places to begin their “Pathway to Success”: the class, a pathway job or directly into apprenticeship. OTN is there for their support and assistance at every step of the way. The Pathways to Success Project, a joint project of OTN, Portland Community
College, the City of Portland and the Labor Education and Research Center,
is funded by a grant from the US Department of Labor.
Since April 2001, 14 women and one man have successfully begun their trades careers through OT’s Pathways to Success program. Of that number, four participants entered apprenticeship programs and 11 entered “pathway” jobs—entry-level jobs in the trades that help people gain the experience they need to enter apprenticeships. Our participants took a wide range of pathway jobs, from flagger to maintenance technician, airplane painter to carpenter’s helper. During the same period last year, only eight women who used our services had entered apprenticeships or pathway jobs. Our great success—and the success of our program participants—this year is a direct result of the development of our Workplace Prep class, from a support group for few to a career planning class for many. Virginia Sponsler, our Pathways career counselor, and Job Developer Penny Painter have remade the class into a rich opportunity to sharpen skills, learn coping mechanisms, gain confidence, and identify options. Virginia recruited retired math teacher Carole Lower to help participants determine their level of math comfort, and she draws on her own expertise as a licensed clinical social worker and career counselor to encourage Pathways participants and give them the best information available. “I will be successful in this non-traditional program because it has been a life dream of mine,” said program participant Bernadette Lee. “Prior to now, I have not had the opportunity or confidence to pursue it.” The Workplace Prep class is open to anyone who has attended a Pathways
information session. Information sessions are scheduled twice per
month, on Thursdays, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Call Penny at 503-943-2226
to find out upcoming dates
and to sign up.
Preparing for Success: Class Offers Career Skills The energy and enthusiasm in the Workplace Prep room is contagious. Every Wednesday afternoon from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., Pathways to Success participants gather together to network, identify resources, provide support for each other, learn new career-related skills, and set individual goals for the next step in their career projects. We have designed the Workplace Prep class to offer a broad range of skills, information and support for Pathways participants as they prepare for success on the job. Recent classes have focused on the job application process; interviewing skills; communication skills; workplace issues; anger control, conflict resolution and problem solving; decision making; and goal setting. As part of our commitment to making use of available community resources, we have featured speakers from other programs in the fields of employment, healthcare and financial planning. Levi Query, M.A., recently presented programs on health and fitness. Carole Lower, our math consultant, regularly provides math skill-building sessions. And one of our Pathways participants, a former financial planner who currently works for Mercy Corps domestic programs, gave a two-session program on issues of money management, including budgeting, saving, and dealing with the realities of having a career that is often seasonal or project-based. In future articles we will highlight the particulars of some of these programs and share Pathways participants’ responses about how what they have learned has influenced their career paths. --Virginia Sponsler, O.T. Career Counselor (12/01) Seven Pathways to Success Workplace Prep participants recently took a job-site field trip to Northwest Roller, a local manufacturing company. We were invited to visit the company by Pathways graduate and new Northwest Roller employee Terri Kindel. Terri researched the trades and worked through the Pathways program to find her “niche” in the workforce. It seems as if she has found it at Northwest Roller! She is very happy in her job and her employer and coworkers are very happy with her work and learning process. Terri and Production Manager Don Harrison took us on a fascinating tour of the company and explained the manufacturing process. Northwest Roller repairs huge rollers that are used in commercial printing. We got to observe each step in the stripping, refining, bearing replacement, rubberizing, baking, and skimming of the rollers. Workers gauge and recheck each roller thoroughly before returning it to the factory it came from. The rollers are primarily used in the printing process, so they must be exact and precise in order to work correctly. Terri’s role is to evaluate the incoming rollers for the type of repair needed. She is also training on all of the other operations in the plant. Congratulations, Terri! (3/02) Early this year, Ken Fry, training director for the IBEW Local 48 electrical apprenticeship programs, approached us with a problem and a plan. The problem was that the number of women and minority apprentices in his programs has gone down. His analysis of the reason for the decline was that fewer women and minority applicants have worked in the electrical industry prior to applying, so they do not tend to score as high as experienced applicants during the interview process. Ken’s plan to diversify his programs included partnering with Oregon Tradeswomen to develop a Basic Skills Training Session, during which the Local 48 electrical instructors would teach participants entry-level electrical skills over a weeklong period and evaluate them for mechanical ability, attendance and attitude. Ken would then recommend the Basic Skills graduates to his contractors, helping them get started on their electrical careers. Ken asked OT to recruit up to 10 female and minority candidates to participate in the course. We really liked the plan, so we publicized the opportunity and found nine excellent candidates who met Ken’s criteria for future success as electricians and could commit to showing up every day, on time. The Basic Skills Training Session took place at the NECA/IBEW Electrical Training Center in February. Six women and three men attended daily from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Throughout the course, the group became a team, determined to work hard to succeed and to make this pilot program a success. They accomplished many challenging tasks put before them. We at OT found that life skills really stood out in preparation for this training class. Some of the students were working at regular jobs, and some were attending college classes as well. Each person had to make his or her own schedule adjustments and arrangements to participate in the Basic Skills course. We coached participants through the process of getting childcare, transportation, transcripts and other items in place. Much had to be done in a short amount of time! That in itself became an endurance test for many of the participants. And the result? The class was a success. Several of the participants were offered jobs in the electrical industry, and the two top-ranked graduates recently accepted jobs at Oregon Electric. Three other participants have begun working in the field, as well. Many thanks to Ken Fry for initiating this pilot project with us, and thanks to all of the instructors who helped with the training class. We also want to thank all of the students who exerted great effort to successfully complete this training and made the class a success. (3/02)
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