Career Connections
Team members: Eric Bellamy, Bill Duda, Jazmon Kearse, David Mathis, Laura McKinney, Joelle Ryan-Cook, Kirby Shealy, Donna Waites
Since the pandemic and “the great resignation,” South Carolina is struggling with what some are calling a workforce crisis: more job openings than people to fill them. The Career Connections team of the Riley Fellows Diversity Leadership Initiative seeks to provide opportunities for youth to be exposed to career fields that they have not been exposed to before and potentially open a pipeline of diverse employees to South Carolina companies.
Career Connections is partnering with the Urban League of Columbia, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to enable African-American and other under-served communities to secure self-reliance, primarily in education, employment, and economic development. The Urban League currently operates a program that incorporates exposing young people to the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) sectors. In today’s technology-driven work environment, STEM has become a pathway for livable income careers. To be eligible to participate in the Urban League’s “STEP” (Science Technology Enrichment Program), the youth must be between 14 and 19 years of age.
The Career Connections group will recruit and educate local businesses about the Urban League’s STEP program. Their participation will foster diversity, equity, and inclusion and enhance recruiting efforts exposing youth from under-served communities to new and varied opportunities. During this pilot project, the Career Connections group will immerse itself in the current 2023 summer STEP program’s partner orientation and members of the group will participate in recruitment and education of employment partners in a variety of sectors. Members of the Career Connections group will also form consortiums of companies and/or organizations in a similar field to offer STEP students 1-2 weeks summer exposure and/or provide shadowing and learning opportunities to students. Consortiums will include: Arts Consortium, led by the Columbia Museum of Art and local arts organizations; Nonprofit Consortium, led by the Sisters of Charity Foundation and Children’s Trust of SC, a group of nonprofit organizations; Legal Consortium, composed of local law firms and potentially law enforcement divisions; and Banking/Finance Consortium, formed by local financial institutions.
In the fall of 2023, the Career Connections group will offer feedback to the Urban League on continued strategies to strengthen recruiting and orientation of the program to a wide range of sectors in Columbia. Also, during the 2023-2024 school year, several members of the Career Connections group will participate in STEP’s afterschool program by hosting field trips and/or placements for students.