Caitlyn Sheehan is a smart, motivated young woman. She works as a financial data-entry employee by day and goes to classes at night at Dutchess Community College for a dental hygienist degree.
But Sheehan may not be where she is now without the help she got two years ago from the youth bureau at the Westchester/Putnam Workforce Investment Board (WPWIB) One-Stop Employment Center in Carmel in Putnam County.
“I went to Brewster High School. And I really always struggled in school,” Sheehan recalled. She and her mother went to Putnam Workforce Partnership, a WPWIB One-Stop center in Carmel. John Hassett, youth coordinator at the Putnam office, and his staff set her up with GED classes and provided her with study materials to take home. She also got help from tutoring classes.
“They also told me that they would help pay if I went to college afterwards,” Sheehan said. “I passed my GED. I got really good scores on it and then after that, I started going to Dutchess Community College. Right now, I am currently still going to school at night to be a dental hygienist.
Putnam Workforce Partnership also found her a job at the Office for the Aging senior center in Carmel. “I have been working here for two years now and work at the finance department. This is an awesome place,” she said.
“I mean, honestly, I didn”™t know what to do because I was struggling in school. And this helped me a lot. I probably wouldn”™t have graduated on time ”“ and maybe not even have any form of diploma at all. And I really don”™t know what I would be doing.” Sheehan said she has since referred a few of her friends to the youth program.
Working together to help teens
Sheehan”™s success is an example of how WPWIB, along with other government agencies, the business community and the not-for-profit sector, assist local teenagers. They offer counseling and refer them to valuable jobs and internships, giving them skills to thrive in life.
WPWIB Director Donnovan Beckford explained that the youth program is unique in that it serves young people from 14 to 21 years old. There are two components: in-school and out-of-school. In a partnership with The Business Council of Westchester, WPWIB also provides consultation and opportunity for the young people to engage in business, including jobs, summer work and internships. “What we are offering is a pipeline of opportunities for young people,” Beckford said.
The local youth program has an impressive success rate. Youth bureau managers and counselors say some 95 percent of the teens who come in successfully finish high school or get a GED and get placed in work, or they continue onward to higher education or other career training.
Hassett, at Putnam Workforce Partnership, said many of the youths are very grateful for the program “because it gives them a second chance to be able to really take control of their own lives and to accomplish things.” Hassett works primarily with out-of-school young people between ages of 17 and 21.
“They know they need the diploma,” to get jobs or continue onto other endeavors, he explained. “So that”™s a priority. They also want to make some money, so that”™s kind of simultaneous in trying to obtain the diploma.”
And by working even part-time or in internships, these teens learn about work ethic and find adult role models. “You develop the work ethic. You know, sometimes that means that you might have to come in a little early or stay a little later to get the job done. And they are exposed to people that do have a very good work ethic and do have good interpersonal skills, and they provide a very good example for these kids.”
For the longer term, the teens decide whether to go into the workplace, get additional career training or apply for a degree in higher education. “There are some setbacks. But as long as they continue to attend, it”™s OK,” Hassett said.
So the number-one requirement is patience, he said. “You have to just wait and keep working with them ”¦ Sometimes they disappear for a little bit and then resurface, and you have to get them through all of the things that they encounter that might be an obstacle to them succeeding in life.”
Frank Williams, executive director of the White Plains Youth Bureau, added that the local youth program really shows that when the community works together to help young people, it creates a win-win situation for everyone.
“And of course the kids that we are working with are going to be the workforce of tomorrow. And it”™s so important that we work with young people when they are young.”
