American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)

The Federal Stimulus Plan - UPDATES

Find out about the ARRA - Federal Stimulus Plan -
What's it all about?  Click here.

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Youth Programs

Meet Some of the Youths in the OIC New Britain's ARRA-Funded Program.  These young adults spent the summer in activities ranging from building an aquarium for an area senior center, to beautifying the city's CTWorks One Stop Career Center entrance, to working at Stanley Tools, the Hospital of Central CT, New Britain Housing Authority and at Celebration Foods, home of Carvel Ice Cream. The last pictuershows the youths completing a national survey that asks about their summer ARRA-funded experience.

 

August, 2009 -Meet Ethan - and aspiring engineer who landed a position at Stanley Works Tools in New Britain this summer through HRA and the federally-funded CWP Summer Youth Employment program!  Here, he is helping update their inventory and catalog of tools and parts in the computer.  He has had a chance to see a lot of what goes into production and particularly likes the scientific aspect to this work.  The staff has asked him about his opinions on efficiency and allowed him to get a glimpse of much of what is going on.

 

August 5, 2009 – Hartford Residents Clear Trails in Union, CT- Today, I visited Bigelow Hollow State Park in Union, CT for the Department of Environmental Protection worksite of the federally-funded Summer Youth Employment  Program. This program consists of clearing the trails and building picnic tables, cleaning up state parks and fixing and cleaning access roads. Nine youths work Tuesday thru Thursday. Most of  them are out-of-school youth and two of them are in high school. Also joining the youths are Mark and Rachel (Rachel works as a part of No Child Left Inside, a special initiative of CT Governor M. Jodi Rell, coordinated by the CT Department of Environmental Protection). Except for the unfortunate bug bite every now and then the youths in the program like the challenge and the new experience.

Photo and story by Antoine Harris, Capital Workforce Partners Communications Coordinator and

Summer Youth Employment Participant.*

 

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August 5, 2009 –Youths Put To Work Executing Social Marketing Campaign Here is a few of the young marketing entrepreneurs learning methods of social media marketing and executing a program to promote Young Studios, its programs, Joe Young's books, and a unique movie project. Using Facebook and other sites, this federally-funded program of the Urban League's part of the Summer Youth Employment program was a win-win for both the youths and the employers.

 

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August 3, 2009 - Youths get a "Blueprint" on What Manufacturing is all About at SPX - thanks to the Federally-Funded ARRA youth employment program. Three New Britain youths have the unique opportunity this summer to work at one of the region's leading manufacturing firms (and a workforce star honorable mention in 2008) - SPX Precision Components in Newington.

 

 

 

 

Photos by Ted Tencza,
CWP Worksite Monitor

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July 2009 - Urban League gets Summer Youth Employment program "on a roll!" - As part of the Summer Youth Employment Program, The Urban League of Greater Hartford has launched a bicycle repair shop in its main office on Woodland Street.  The participants are responsible for collecting bike donations, repairing the bicycles and selling and marketing the refurbished products.  The program participants are required to complete a business plan, and aims to teach entrepreneurial fundamentals, repair techniques and marketing strategies while encouraging healthy living and safety in the community. 

 

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July 29, 2009 - New Britain Counselors Find "Cool" Ways To Refresh The Community - Capital Workforce Partners, CT Housing and Finance Authority, The Boy Scouts and the New Britain Herald visited CPS Properties (Konover) where they started a camp for the neighborhood youths. The kids who live in the neighborhood are able to attend the camp for free. The youth counselors (funded by the Federal ARRA Employment Program) and the kids who are a part of the program seem to get along great. The camp provides them with place to release there unique energies in a positive way while also having fun.

 

- Photo, article and web posting by Antoine Harris – ARRA Summer Youth Employment Participant – Communications Coordinator with Capital Workforce Partners

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July 22, 2009 - CRT's Energy Department - As part of the federally funded ARRA Program, ten "out-of-school" youths were hired and assigned to Community Renewal Team's EnergyAssistance Department. No job is easy and this one is no exception. Xavier ( in photo left ) has been assigned as a call center representative. Call center representatives at CRT take about 365 calls on average in just two days. Xavier and all the youths here are enthusiastic about the challenge and they take it on without hesitation. The youths in this program are excelling well and some may be even offered full-time jobs if positions are available at the program's completion.

 

- Photo, article and web posting by Antoine Harris – ARRA Summer Youth Employment Participant – Communications Coordinator with Capital Workforce Partners

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July 22, 2009 - New Britain Consolidated School District and CCSU have the Summer Youth Employment Program "wired" - As part of the Summer Youth Employment Program, Central Connecticut State University Information Technology Services Worksite has its students working on wire management and other IT service calls throughout the campus.  Not only are these youths getting work experience in IT, their getting a good sense of what the college is all about.

* Program funded by the American Recovery and Renvestment Act and administered through Capital Workforce Partners

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• July 6 - The Summer Youth Employment and Learning Program Now Underway - Over 1,100 qualified youths are starting to attend orientations and finding out where their worksites are. 

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Adult and Dislocated Worker Programs

Thanks to the Federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) Capital Workforce Partners has been able to establish 893 training slots - some for:

• Incumbent Worker Training and On the Job Training - at Regional Businesses
• CTWorks - Individual Training Accounts
• Community College Targeted Classroom Programs