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This Week, Tell Congress to Support Older Workers

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, workers who are 55 and older will make up one-quarter of the civilian workforce by 2020. This stark figure demonstrates that older workers will continue to need support. You can show your support for older workers by telling Congress to support S. 192, the Older Americans Act Reauthorization of 2015. S. 192 reauthorizes the Older Americans Act and key services and programs for America’s seniors including the Senior Community Service and Employment Program (SCSEP). The Goodwill agencies that serve older adults 55 and older through SCSEP served 8361 new participants since 2006 and have placed 2444 to employment with full benefits. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, workers who are 55 and older will make up one-quarter of the civilian workforce by 2020. This stark figure demonstrates that older workers will continue to need support.

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My Story: Tina Bouatic

At age 14, my parents got divorced. They were both drinking and fighting a lot. I started hanging with the wrong crowd. I started cutting school, cutting classes and began to smoke cigarettes. Eventually, while doing drugs and drinking – I went out, stayed out late. I basically stopped going to school. I got pregnant.

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On Labor Day, and Every Day, Goodwill® Thinks About How to Put People to Work

Many associate Labor Day with the end of summer, a three-day weekend and the start of a new school year. Families and friends gather for barbecues and one last outing to the pool until next year. Rarely do folks sit around on Labor Day and actually celebrate America’s workers, think of ways to get more people in the workforce or consider how to lessen the unemployment rate. Unless, that is, you work for Goodwill®.

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Obion County, TN: A Case Study in Goodwill’s Community Impact

When the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. factory in Obion County, TN, shut down in 2011, the local unemployment rate soared past 18 percent. Many of the 1,800 laid off workers struggled with even the first step toward finding a new job. Numerous displaced workers received assistance with their resumes at the Goodwill Career Solutions Center in Union City, the county seat.

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My Story: Cassandra Rolle

Cassandra Rolles came to Goodwill Industries of the Southern Piedmont (Charlotte, NC) in 2013. The Goodwill helped her gain employment skills and experience through a variety of temporary positions before connecting her with a temp-to-perm position in the county government.

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My Story: Nadia Patterson

When Nadia Patterson moved from New York to North Carolina with her children, she had limited job prospects. Goodwill Industries of the Southern PIedmont (Charlotte, NC) helped her get back on track by earning her GED, pursuing secondary education and landing a job in her dream field as a pharmacy technician.

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Urge Congress to Support the Second Chance Reauthorization Act

I visited the Hudson County Jail in northern New Jersey. Twenty years later, I can still vividly remember the rhythmic sound of sturdy locks opening, followed by heavy doors slamming shut, and then the locks swinging back home. It was a deafening and consistent reminder to the residents of that institution that they were “inmates” who were very, very bad.

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Sneaking Summer Into Your Workspace

Alas, the days of summer vacation are in the past for most of us, so we pass up the pool in favor of a paycheck every Monday through Friday. But that doesn’t mean your summer style must be compromised! Unless you’re lucky enough to work outside and enjoy this glorious season before it’s gone, you may need to consciously include it in your 9-5 life.

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My Story: Shawnteal Turner

I was the one hanging out with the gang members on the street corners doing whatever, not really accomplishing anything with my life, you know… not even paying attention to what I was really doing. A friend of mine kicked me in the butt and was like, “You need to get a job, and Goodwill is having a job fair so come on, let’s go.” I went to a job fair at Goodwill Seattle (WA), and then I met Allison Gerttula. She told me about Goodwill’s Youth Green Corps and I was like great, sign me up, and that’s how I got started.

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Help End the Nation’s Prison Dependency Problem

In 1971, while struggling to find an exit strategy from the Vietnam War, President Nixon declared a new war – the War on Drugs. He proposed fighting this war on both the supply side, by cracking down on drug pushers, and on the demand side by investing in strategies to rehabilitate people who were dependent on drugs. Unfortunately, drug abuse remains a serious problem. However, tough sentencing for drug-related crime has done little to deter those on the supply side. Instead, incarceration rates have steadily increased from just under 200,000 people in state and federal prisons in 1971, to more than 1.5 million in 2013.

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