La Salle University
La Salle University partnership helps prepare local high school students for future careers
Representatives from La Salle, the Nonprofit Center at La Salle University, and Philadelphia Youth Network, with Senator Art Haywood saw the value of the WorkReady VIP Program at a worksite visit.
Three of the Building 21 high school students interned and volunteered at Why Not Prosper, a grassroots nonprofit that supports formerly incarcerated women as they reintegrate into the community. Pictured are the three student interns, Senator Haywood, and representatives from PYN, The Nonprofit Center at La Salle University, and Why Not Prosper.
La Salle University and the Nonprofit Center at La Salle University had the opportunity to partner with Senator Art Haywood and Philadelphia Youth Network (PYN) to offer the WorkReady VIP Program to 12 students attending Building 21 high school.
The WorkReady VIP Program helps to prepare students for their careers and build a solid foundation through career readiness training, paid internships, and dedicated mentorship. Once they complete a thirty hour training program, the students are placed in paid internships at one of six local nonprofits.
Senator Haywood organized worksite visits to get a firsthand look at the successful partnerships in action.
Three of the Building 21 students interned and volunteered at Why Not Prosper, a grassroots nonprofit that supports formerly incarcerated women by providing programs and services that help them as they reintegrate into the community.
At the visit to Why Not Prosper, the student interns talked about the type of work they had done during their internship, the things they valued most about the experience, what they learned about themselves, and their desire to continue the program so that they or other students could experience the same thing.
“We hope that we can get funding for future years so that we can continue to create these opportunities in the summer, as well as the career readiness and workshops that we do during the year with La Salle,” Haywood said at the visit.
“One of my goals is to do as much as we can to get our young people into opportunities so they can continue their careers, find their destinies, build their dignity,” he told the students. “What you all showed me today is fantastic, I can’t describe in words how proud I am of you.”
Haywood was not alone in the sentiment, Lori Moffa, director of consulting at The Nonprofit Center at La Salle, and the attendees from PYN all expressed a desire to keep the program going forward in future years.
-Naomi Thomas