11/19/2009 - Recovering America's Youth Summit
Recovering America's Youth Summit in Chicago
Chicago's a very interesting city. I'd like to go back to visit sometime for several days.
The Recovering America's Youth Summit (the reason I was there) was somewhat less interesting, but OK. It struck me that we heard a lot of "what I did last summer" stories - long on description and short on reflection. And I had a lot of trouble figuring out in what ways I could use most of these stories; many of these stories were from very urban areas. It is challenging to translate activities happening in New York City or Detroit to rural Oregon - the TOC/OWA region is over 78,000 square miles with an estimated 2008 population of over 803,300. That's approximately 10 people per square mile. Detroit, on the other hand, has a population density of over 6,300 people per square mile (New York has over 27,000 people per square mile). The service delivery options are very, very different as are the available support networks and local resources. Culturally, ethnically... it's probably easier to find differences than similarities other than high unemployment. Really, thinking about fitting programs in Detroit and New York to programs in rural Oregon boggles the imagination.
That said, there were some highlights. One of the more enjoyable presentations I got to see (there were many I didn't get to see since many occurred simultaneously) was from Gailmarie Harris, the Director of Youth Services and Corporate Development for the Central Ohio Workforce Investment Corporation. She presented on getting older out-of-school youth interested, involved and engaged. She talked about using "art" as part of the assessment process - so, for instance, some older youth created silhouettes of themselves that included aspects of job possibilities, their skills (current and desired) and where they see themselves in the future. This gave the career counselors a platform from which to build a career development plan that engaged the older youth creatively. It also helped address generational and cultural barriers. I thought it was a pretty nifty idea.
Another important component for engaging youth of any age that was brought up was the use of technology and information. For instance, many youth have low, if any, financial literacy. That is, they may not know how to use the banking system, how or why to save, etc. In New York, they used debit cards to pay their youth participants. This makes a lot of sense to me - how many of us still regularly write checks? We are going to an electronic system and that is what we should be training on. This also gave the career counselors the opportunity to discuss the difference between debit cards and credit cards which often blossomed into a discussion about credit and fiscal responsibility. In Central Ohio, again, Ms. Harris talked about using a Web-based Portal to allow youth greater control and access to their eligibility information as well an ability to see their payroll information. I think to get and keep youth and young adults interested we will have to be creative and innovative about the use of technology.
I had a great chat with Janet Howard, the Deputy Director for Michigan's Department of Labor and Economic Growth, about programs around her state. They have a very focused outreach drive occurring for veterans and their spouses. They got a list of all the people from the state who were in the military and sent them a letter explaining how they might offer services after they finish their military duties. They also worked together with Dow Chemical and local community colleges to crosswalk military duties and skills with the skills needed for different jobs at Dow. So all the parties can look at a military resume, for instance, and see how skills translate. Ms. Howard was very informative during our mutual bus ride back to the airport. I appreciate her thoughts and passion about workforce development.
Glad I went, but think the upcoming rural workforce development summit we are planning with the Idaho DOL for next May, ultimately, will prove more directly useful.
- Monty