Commissioners Announce Summer Youth Employment Results More than 1,950 Summer Jobs

The Franklin County Board of Commissioners and Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman are celebrating the number of teenagers and young adults who were given jobs and internships - and valuable careerbuilding skills and education - as part of this year’s summer youth employment program.

As part of the 2012 SOAR hire! Program, a total of 1,951 youth and young adults ages 14-24 received paid internships through the public-private partnership which included local government, community based organizations, educational institutions, and private sector employers. The program is run by the Central Ohio Workforce Investment Corporation (COWIC).

SOAR hire! Summer 2012 was supported by $2.7 million in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families funds through Franklin County’s Learn, Earn, and Return initiative, $440,000 from the City of Columbus, $250,000 from the U.S. Department of Labor and Workforce Investment Act, and more than $975,000 from local companies who hired and paid some of the young people out of their own budgets.

As a partner in the U.S. Department of Labor’s “Summer Jobs+” initiative, the program also provided learning experiences this summer, bringing the total number of youth served to more than 3,000. Other services included work readiness training, job expos and job match events with private sector employers, job coaching, career exploration, and financial literacy training, provided through partnership with Huntington Bank, PNC Bank, and Kemba Financial Credit Union.

The youth summer employment program was part of the County Commissioners’ “Investing in our Next Generation” initiative - a year-long examination of the estimated $343 million in total investments that County agencies will make in youth and child-oriented programs in 2012, and how these agencies and programs can work better together to increase their impact on Franklin County’s young people.