Youth at Prevailing Job Prep benefited from a successful summer jobs program.

In February 2009, President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) which provided $1.2 billion to support summer jobs for disadvantaged youth nationwide. Detroit received $11 million.

The appropriation presented a major opportunity for us in Detroit—it was the biggest influx of funds for youth employment in over a decade.  But it also presented major challenges. How were we to design and implement a major youth jobs program that would provide meaningful work experiences for Detroit’s youth in only four months?

Well, we did it! The documentation of Detroit’s successful employment of more than 7,000 youth in 2009 can be found in Brandeis University’s “Innovating Under Pressure: The Story of the 2009 Recovery Act Summer Youth Employment Initiative. “  Released on October 21, 2010 by the Employment and Training Administration of the U. S. Department of Labor, the report is a case study and “lessons learned” from four communities with summer youth employment programs: Detroit, Chicago, Indianapolis/Marion County and Phoenix/Maricopa County. The report was conducted by the Center for Youth and Communities at Brandeis University.

Acknowledging that all four cities were forced to plan and implement a summer youth employment program before receiving vital information or critical funds, the cities were also models of success. The hallmark of Detroit’s program was its strong public-private collaboration and philanthropic support.

The leadership of The Skillman Foundation was critical to the success of the Detroit program. Detroit was able to build upon the expertise of the foundation’s Detroit Youth Employment Consortium. Additionally, The Skillman Foundation provided flexible financial support that enabled the Consortium and City Connect Detroit to move forward before the federal funds became available. According to the Brandeis report, “This proved to be an essential factor of success.”

The Skillman Foundation CEO Carol Goss

The Brandeis study team “also discovered a vibrant hidden infrastructure of vision, hope, energy, and leadership – and a true ‘discipline of innovation’ – among a core group of game changers in Detroit.” City Connect Detroit is proud to be cited among those “game changers” in Detroit. The federal funds were received by the Detroit Workforce Development Department (DWDD). DWDD selected City Connect Detroit to serve as the summer youth employment coordinator because, as the report said, City Connect Detroit has “a reputation for getting things done.” City Connect Detroit’s main strength, however, is collaboration. Through its participation in the Detroit Youth Employment Consortium and its partnership with the Youth Development Commission, City Connect was able to link the program with valuable community leadership and resources. The Skillman Foundation provided critical financial support during the early implementation of the program.

“Forming internal collaborative working groups or teams to share the responsibility and establish an ‘all hands on deck’ strategy also contributed to success in the four communities,” said the report. “The Chicago and Detroit SYEI experiences were especially noteworthy in this regard.”

Detroit was also cited for its innovative job placements which exposed youth to new economy jobs in healthcare, and the creative and performing arts.  According to the report, “Detroit offers the best example of developing green jobs through a private sector partnership devoted to the ‘Greening of Detroit.’”

Despite a deep recession and the very short lead time, Detroit was able to provide meaningful work experiences for more than 7,000 youth, representing 42 percent of the 16,650 youth employed across all four cities.

I agree with the quote included in the report that “ramping up to serve 7,000 kids is not without incident.” But as the report documents, the Detroit collaboration “innovated under pressure and combated obstacles with social and intellectual capital, material assets, and the political will, skills, and strategy to seize this opportunity to make Detroit work for kids.”

This is the bottom line: In Detroit, we got the job done and we did it right. That’s the power of collaboration.

First Lady Yvette Bing (right) came to City Connect to talk about homelessness.

The Detroit Collaborative to End Homelessness Together faciliated by City Connect Detroit has long been concerned about the plight of the homeless, which has largely affected women and their children. With the problem growing among the nation’s young adults, I was pleased that two of Detroit’s community leaders are meeting to figure out how to bring more awareness to the issue: Detroit First Lady Yvette Bing and Compuware Chief Administrative Officer Denise Starr.

Recently, the First Lady and Ms. Starr came to talk about the homeless issue and what they could do to help. In 2007, the McGregor Fund supported the establishment of the Detroit Collaborative to End Homelessness Together. Facilitated by City Connect Detroit, the collaborative is focused upon providing permanent supportive housing. Too often, homeless initiatives have been targeted at the causes of homelessness, including  chronic unemployment, substance abuse and poor education. However, we have learned that the homeless need to be stabilized in a home first—supportive services can be wrapped around the families once they have their basic needs met.

In order to produce more permanent supportive housing, the collaboration hopes to  turn existing vacant and/or foreclosed homes into supportive housing or even build new housing for the homeless. The initiative is called Project HOME.

Compuware Chief Administrative Officer Denise Starr is committed to enlisting the private sector in ending homelessness.

Despite the daunting scope of the problem—now exacerbated by a recession and record foreclosures—lead collaborative partners including the Homeless Action Network in Detroit (HAND), the Coalition on Temporary Shelter (COTS), and the Michigan Department of Community Health, are all helping  Project HOME raise much-needed public and private dollars. In October 2010, lead collaborator Neighborhood Service Organization announced that it will conduct a $50 million renovation of the Michigan Bell Building on Oakman Boulevard. The project will house 155 one-bedroom apartments for single occupants, and serve as the new headquarters for NSO and its 200 staff members.

Both the First Lady and Ms. Starr are heartened by these efforts and hope that Detroit’s public and private sectors can join hands to end homelessness.

“Everyone has a right to have somewhere to live,” said First Lady Bing. “If government can’t completely address the problem, then we as citizens must do it. It’s an unacceptable plight for someone not to have a home.”

Compuware’s Denise Starr agreed: “So many of us have warm food and are cozy in our homes, but we don’t realize that a crisis could put us one step away from being homeless. Those of us who are blessed to have a home can’t take it for granted and forget those left behind.”

The collaboration wants to end homelessness in the next decade. With the support and leadership of women like First Lady Bing and Ms. Denise Starr to galvanize public-private partnerships, I know it’s possible.

I was entertained by his fond memories of the things he did as a kid to earn money. But what surprised me is how little public policy over the past 20 years has had any real impact upon the black youth unemployment problem.

Still, it’s interesting to read about the former president’s predictions and where we find ourselves today. This is taken from a speech President Clinton gave at the Summer Jobs Conference in Arlington, Virginia on April 14, 1993:

When I was 13, I made a very foolish short-term business investment: I set up a comic book stand and sold two things full of comic books. Made more money than I had ever had in my life. But if I had saved those trunks, they’d be worth $100,000 today.  That does not mean young people should not be entrepreneurial. It just means that you can’t foresee a generation ahead. I have mowed yards and cleared land and built houses and worked in body shops and the parts departments of a car dealership. And I’ve done a lot of different things for a living. Some people say I got into politics to escape work.

I learned something from every job I ever had. But I grew up in a generation where I literally did not know a living soul, without regard to race or income, who wanted to work who didn’t have a job. I grew up in a generation when all you had to really say to people is, get an education, and you’ll be all right. You’ll get a job, and you’ll make more money next year than you did this year. Now I live in a generation full of people, most of whom don’t make any more money in real dollars than they did 10 years ago, and they’re working longer hours, and they’re paying more for the basics of life. And we are now wondering whether we can create the jobs that these young people want.

Now, I want to close by reemphasizing these two things: It doesn’t matter what kind of economic policies this administration pursues or how much productivity increases there are in the private sector. If young Americans don’t get a good education, don’t learn how to work, and can’t be productive, those jobs will not be created in this country. Machines will do the work, or the work will be done off-shore by people who have the same skill levels and can work for a third or a fourth or a fifth the wages. So nothing we can do economically will matter unless we build the skills and capacities of America’s work force. And anybody that pretends otherwise is just kidding.

This is a major reason why we continue to provide pathways to employment and education for the more than 100,000 Detroit young people who are struggling to find jobs. If you’d like to support our efforts, go to our Grow Detroit’s Young Talent website, or contact Kathleen Moloney at 313. 887.6514.

As I talked with several youth this summer, I have been reminded that closed environments rarely lead to wide horizons. Urban youth starve for a chance to expand their worlds and explore new opportunities. That’s one of the many benefits of our summer youth employment program.

Take, Joseph Jenkins, an 18-year-old who has worked in many different places, from Eastern Market to the State Theater. But until this summer, he had never stepped inside a corporate office. When he went to work for the Compuware Corporation, it transformed his life.

“I had seen things like this on TV, but I never pictured myself in a suit and working on computers,” he said about the upscale work setting. “It made me say to myself that this may be a path that I want to take.”

Suddenly, the business environment is not just a Hollywood set, but a tangible goal: “A month ago, I wasn’t saying anything like this, because I never had this type of experience,” he said.

Bingo. Some of our youth employment crisis has to do with a lack of jobs and low skills. But some of it has to do with a lack of vision. Young people don’t see opportunity in front of them. In fact, they have no idea about the breadth of experiences that so many of us take for granted.

Not only did Joseph get a taste of what it’s like to work in a corporate environment, he got an inkling of what it took to land that kind of job. Here are a few things he noted:

• You have to stay focused, stay on the right track and get your diploma.
• Some of the people have been working here for 13 years, but many got their start as interns.
• People get internships when they go to college.

Now, he’s more focused on college and web design. What a transformation for a young man who was intent on making millions in the rap industry.

Safety is Job One

The summer employment program helped Joseph break one other barrier to work: safety.

“I like being in this environment because it’s safe,” said Joseph about going downtown to work at Compuware. “If you’re picking up trash in neighborhoods, you’re working hard, but you might not feel safe. Compuware is a great location; you feel safe and comfortable.”

Safety has registered as a big concern for Detroit’s young people as they look for work. Some have parents who have forbidden them from working because of perceived hazards in neighborhoods or riding public transportation. A 2009 University of Michigan study of the Detroit Summer Youth Employment Program revealed that  83.8 percent of the youth surveyed said “I felt safe when I was at my workplace.”

For so many young people, having a safe range of work options and caring role models are a normal part of growing up. Why shouldn’t Detroit youth have the same opportunities?

Jazmine Graves, 16, and her mother, Sharon Van Horn, celebrate Jazmine's first paycheck

Beginning Friday, July 23, 2010, more than 2,000 young people began receiving paychecks from the two summer youth employment programs administered by City Connect Detroit. Some youth are part of the publicly-funded Detroit Summer Youth Employment Program (DSYEP) that we run along with the Detroit Workforce Development Department. Other young people are being employed paid by our private campaign to “Grow Detroit’s Young Talent.” But no matter the source of their paychecks, they all have been working for the betterment of our city – from pharmacy to farming. 

So many in our community have been touched by the nightmare of adult unemployment. However devastating that has been, the youth unemployment rate is easily three times adult unemployment levels. But at least with this payday, thousands of Detroit youth will not only experience the pride of earning money on their own, but they will also set out on the path toward becoming productive adult workers. Studies show that these summer experiences can impact their future ability to earn wages. And the relationships that youth forge with their worksite mentors can be invaluable for a lifetime. 

Ozella Harbin was there when her 14-year-old daughter, Brittany Hudson, received her first-ever paycheck on Friday. “We are in such a rut,” Harbin said about the current economic situation. “If our children don’t get the chance to learn how to work now, it will be harder for them in the future.” 

Brittany loves her work beautifying Cody High School this summer. “I’m going to spend some of my money and save some,” she grinned. 

Youth employment is not a panacea to our broader employment concerns, but it is the piece of the problem City Connect is committed to solving. What better investment than to bring the hope of productive citizenship into a young person’s life? 

Sharon VanHorn, 35, knows what kind of hope a summer job can bring. She got her first summer job through the DSYEP 20 years ago. “If it wasn’t for our summer jobs, my sister wouldn’t have been able to buy a prom dress,” she said. “A summer job kind of saved my life—back in the day, we wouldn’t have had school clothes if it weren’t for summer jobs.” 

Now her 16-year-old daughter Jazmine Graves is working in DYSEP. “I like the kids I work with at Fitness Home Care for Children,” said Jazmine. “I’m going to put some of my money in the bank.” 

Especially for Detroit, this is certainly a moment of celebration. When I look into the proud faces of the young people receiving their first checks, I’m filled with joy – not just for them, but for our city that is sending a message to its young people that they have a bright future right here at home.

Detroit City Councilmember Shaunteel Jenkins is present when Dr. Geneva Williams receives an award from the Census Bureau.

The 2010 Census is drawing to a close. From my discussions with the Census Bureau, our city’s 2010 population could be on par with the count for the 2000 Census, stemming concerns about deep population losses for Detroit. Such losses could mean cuts in federal dollars allotted to Detroit, as well as a dilution of the city’s political power.

This is a remarkable achievement given the tremendous hardships that have beset the Motor City since the last census. Massive foreclosures, joblessness, an increase in homelessness, and elevated suspicion of the government since 9/11, have all made it difficult to identify and count everyone who lives in the city.

Last week, representatives from the Census Bureau awarded us a certificate of appreciation for the work we have done on behalf of the Mayor’s Complete Count Committee to make sure every Detroiter was counted. Although I am deeply appreciative of the award, our city’s success is a collaborative victory. City Connect’s work would not have been possible without support from the Michigan Nonprofit Association, the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan, the Skillman Foundation, the Knight Foundation and the Ford Foundation. Because of their support, City Connect was able to make 51 mini-grants available to Detroit community based organizations, touching tens of thousands of Detroiters with messages, training and direct engagement about the importance of the census.

We are so pleased that both the Census Bureau and the City of Detroit turned to the nonprofit community to insure a complete census count. Nonprofits are trusted by the communities they serve, and often know how to craft messages that directly address grassroots concerns. They speak the same language as their constituents and often have a vested interested in maintaining federal support for their causes through an accurate census count.

We thank the many groups who made it a priority to raise census awareness and participation, including our nonprofit partners, Data Driven Detroit, Michigan Voice, ACCESS, Michigan Nonprofit Association, the Leadership Council for Civil Rights and the Skillman Good Neighborhoods. We also received strong support for the Census Bureau’s Partnership Specialists.

We await the final numbers from the 2010 Census. But we know that no matter the outcome, it would have been much lower if not for the tireless dedication of the nonprofit agencies who serve Detroit.

Thanks for your efforts to make sure that every Detroiter counts!       

Georgetown University Professor Harry Holzer urges policymakers to support young workers.

I was heartened to read in the New York Times last week that factory owners have been slowly adding jobs since the beginning of the year. But before I was able to celebrate the good news, I read the bad news: The manufacturing sector has also been moving toward greater automation. That means that even though factories are hiring, they’re not replacing the low-skilled workers that they employed before the recession. The low-skilled jobs have been sent offshore.

Domestically, manufacturers are looking for workers with computer skills, those who can read blueprints and those who can do higher-level math. For young Detroiters, this creates a unique opportunity. If employers aren’t hiring back low-skilled workers, then there’s a vacuum that young, prepared workers may start to fill. That’s why we at City Connect Detroit feel that now is the time for employers to look seriously at providing summer employment opportunities for our young talent.

With black youth unemployment rates soaring past 50 and 60 percent, it’s easy to understand how young people  may begin to see the search for work as futile. But the truth is that, if they are willing to work hard in school, 18-24-year-olds may actually have more opportunity for entry-level jobs. With a bit of preparation and motivation, young workers can begin to leapfrog over older workers as employers look for workers with newer, more  technical skills.

Just last month, Georgetown University Professor Harry Holzer testified before the Congressional  Joint Economic Committee. The name of his lecture grabbed my attention: “Avoiding a Lost Generation: How to Minimize the Impact of the Great Recession on Young Workers.”  Here is how he is advising public policymakers to make sure that young workers are prepared for the economic recovery:

I also support extensions of summer youth employment programs, but much prefer year-round programs linked to schooling or other skill-building components attached. And publicly paid “transitional jobs” for hard-to-employ groups should be expanded as well.

But high-quality education and training options for youth, and especially those who are disadvantaged, should also be enhanced. These options should be designed to address longer-term problems, but should be ramped up now while unemployment for young people is so high. And, wherever possible, these efforts should include opportunities for them to gain some type of paid work experience, at least partly subsidized by government.

For young people in high school, this means dropout prevention efforts, high-quality career and technical education options, and subsidized internships and apprenticeships. Programs that create pathways for high school students into postsecondary programs should be further developed.

With or without federal support for these programs, City Connect is committed to making these pathways to productive adulthood possible. Our campaign to Grow Detroit’s Young Talent is a major public/private partnership to raise jobs and money to give urban youth a constructive work experience. We can’t afford to lose another generation to a lifetime of poverty and low productivity.

With your involvement, we won’t have to.
It’s not too late! If you would like to employ a young person this summer, or donate funds so that a young person may be placed in a job, contact us at 313-879-1GRO (879-1476), or email Kathleen@cityconnectdetroit.org.

For more information on the Grow Detroit’s Young Talent Campaign, go to www.growdetroitsyoungtalent.org.

Together we can lift Detroit youth above a destiny of violence.

On June 22, 2010 City Connect Detroit participated in a National Forum on Youth Violence Prevention sponsored federal government along with Detroit Mayor Dave Bing. City Connect has been involved with youth development since its inception in 2001. Over the past two years, it has played a lead role in youth employment programs. 

But what does all that have to do with youth violence? 

Simple. When young people have no constructive ways to spend their time, and when they feel that work is beyond reach, violence and delinquency are not far around the corner. 

When I was the CEO at United Way Community Services in the 1980s, researchers were just beginning to treat youth violence as a holistic community problem. I helped lead a citywide initiative to encircle at-risk youth with services that included structured recreational and work opportunities. Thirty years later, this is no longer a ground-breaking approach to reducing violence, but it is still just as necessary. 

I was impressed that, along with the mayor’s chief of staff, Saul Green, representatives from the Departments of Justice, Education and Housing and Urban Development were present at the forum. That reflects what we already know at the local level: youth crime is a many-headed hydra that requires inter-agency and inter-organizational cooperation at all levels. 

It was heartening to know that we had all the expertise we needed around the table, which included long-time, grassroots warriors like Boys and Girls Club, Midnight Golf, Detroit Workforce Development and ACCESS. Adpot-a-Child’s venerable Delores Bennett—w ho has been engaging youth on Detroit’s North End for most of her 80-plus years—said it best when she said, “You just need to listen to them; they’re crying out for love.” 

Jack Calhoun, a senior consultant to the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs recounted his experience with the 13 California City Gang Prevention Network that he currently directs. “In our intervention program, there’s an employee who greets every child, no matter how ‘dangerous,’ with the words, ‘Hello, loved one.’” 

Thomas Abt, counselor to the Asst. Attorney General for the Office of Justice Programs, was impressed with the “level of commitment and the level of candor in the room.” 

 “I see that Detroit has lots of assets, capital and willingness to partner with the business and philanthropic community to address issues of violence,” he said. 

That is exactly what City Connect is doing with its public-private partnership to Grow Detroit’s Young Talent. If we don’t provide pathways to work for our young people, it’s a crime. 

If you have a job that you would like to offer to a young person or are willing to donate so that we can place young people in work experiences, call: 313-879-1GRO (879-1476).

Peter Karmanos, Carol Goss and Detroit Mayor Dave Bing are champions of summer jobs for youth

Last week was an amazing one for the City of Detroit and for us at City Connect. Under the radar, a group of about 60 business leaders gathered for a “Breakfast of Champions” at the Compuware Headquarters downtown to make a commitment to youth summer employment. They had been personally invited by Detroit Mayor Dave Bing, Skillman Foundation CEO Carol Goss and Compuware CEO Peter Karmanos, Jr. to pledge to provide valuable work experiences for Detroit’s talented youth.   

It amazed me that in these tough economic times, so many people stepped up to the plate–like James Giordano, CEO of CareTech Solutions. “I get so many requests each year to support so many initiatives,” he said, “But when I got this one, I knew I had to be there.”   

In fact, we got several companies pledge to either hire young people between the ages of 14 and 24, or to donate funds to help City Connect place a young person at a public or nonprofit agency this summer. Why would they pledge to do so when so many adults are desperately seeking employment? Simple—because we all remember the first time someone looked us up and down and decided to take a risk. And we remember how our first jobs –from a paper route, to babysitting, to being someone’s assistant—were such character-shaping experiences for us.   

That was true for Mayor Bing, who described how his paper route at age 9 taught him how to be on time and how to do an excellent job, no matter the task. Carol Goss described her first real job as a teaching assistant for a Head Start program at age 17. “The teachers there encouraged me to go forward in life,” she said. “They told me I could do whatever I wanted to do.”   

And for Peter Karmanos, a self-described “troubled youth,” life took an unexpected shift when a man he met in the lobby of an office building hired him on the spot to assist in his new computer department. “That’s how my company began,” Karmanos told the business leaders gathered at the breakfast. “Important things can happen when you give kids a chance to find out who they are.”   

Amen to that. We know that one way to stem chronic unemployment is to expose young people to the business environment and career options at an early age. And, according to our research of the 7,000 youths who participated in last year’s Summer Youth Employment Program, more than one-third of the young people contributed their earnings to meet household expenses. Youth summer jobs are a win-win, for corporations, for young people, for their families and for Detroit.   

If you would like to donate to the 2010 Community Campaign for Youth Summer Jobs, please call Tanjia Wilkerson, 313-887-6515.

(l to r) Dr. Geneva J. Williams, Elizabeth Higgins of Chicago Youth Programs and Dr. Jenifer Cartland of Children's Memorial Research Center

On April 23, 2010, I attended a conference on Community Engaged Research sponsored by the University of Michigan Institute for Clinical & Health Research. The purpose of the conference was to help bridge the wide divide between academic research and real-life community solutions. 

This is an issue close to my heart. For the past two years, City Connect Detroit has incubated a project called Data Driven Detroit, a nationally recognized nonprofit that promotes the practical use of data in community building and policy making. I firmly believe that social data must be made accessible to those who can use it to improve the quality of life for all. 

At the conference, keynote speaker Dr. Lawrence Green said that collaborations should not consist of “pipelines” from academia to the community, but should consist of a bridge or partnership between the two. Those are heartening words coming from an adjunct professor of epidemiology and biostatistics and the director of the Social and Behavioral Sciences Program at the University of California at San Francisco.  

Following the keynote address, I moderated a panel on “Stories of Community Engaged Research.” This session contained two teams of researchers and community leaders – one team from Northwestern University in Chicago and another from York University in Toronto.  Both teams provided fascinating stories about how community based participatory research can make a difference in the community. 

Dr. Williams moderating a panel on "Stories of Community Engaged Research"

I was intrigued by how Elizabeth Higgins of Chicago Youth Programs and Dr. Jenifer Cartland of Children’s Memorial Research Center have teamed up to effectively support youth through meaningful research. 

In Canada, York University’s Dr. Sarah Flicker and Planned Parenthood of Toronto’s Susan Flynn, joined forces to conduct the Toronto Teen Survey. The survey managed to educate Toronto’s teens about sexual health while simultaneously gathering important data for research. 

The study asked more than 1,200 teenagers about their experience accessing sexual health information and services in Toronto. The study found that many teens faced significant barriers accessing services. It also discovered that many Ontario teens do not have adequate access to health education in their schools.  

A major reason for the success of the project was the fact that teens themselves were included in the administration of the survey.  This is an element that we at City Connect try to include in all of our collaboratives: Solutions must be forged by those who are directly experiencing the problem in order to be sustainable and effective. 

Besides effectively educating Toronto teens about sexual health, the results of the Survey have been utilized by policymakers in the province of Ontario when formulating education policy. This is a powerful example of how community based participatory research can directly affect the lives of people outside of the academy. 

But how does research make the leap from science to policy? Several other speakers weighed in on the subject, including Dr. Phyllis Meadows. She is the associate director, of the Office of Public Health Practice at the University of Michigan’s School of Public Health. She’s also a senior fellow at the Kresge Foundation. Dr. Meadows emphasized that in order for research to lead to policy change, the culture of the academic institution will have to change. She argued that researchers are too concerned with impressing other researchers and not concerned with what is happening in the community.  

At City Connect, we have learned that neighborhoods are full of knowledgeable, vocal advocates who crave access to data that validate their life experiences. Enlisting the community in the research process can create “ground troops” for community change. I wholly ascribe to Dr. Meadow’s contention that researchers need to go beyond embracing the community and take an active role in the implementation process.  

The day was an important chance for community advocates and researchers to begin to understand how we can collaborate more effectively. I’m sure that in doing so, we’ll discover the power—and the data to prove—that we can make the world a better place.