• Description
• Mission
• Model
• Partnerships
• The New Careers Program
• Why Prisoner Reentry Matters
• Calendar of Events

 
Description

Coming Home for good - The New Careers Project

One of the most difficult issues facing individuals coming home after prison is the ability to find work. The New Careers Project serves men and women returning to Greater Newark from state and federal prisons. The project's goal is to help returnees get and keep jobs by teaching job acquisition and job retention skills and by helping them overcome personal and structural obstacles to employment.

New Careers is a demonstration project launched by the Institute in February 2006. The New Careers model combines immediate, short-term work experience with comprehensive case management, employment readiness and life skills training, job placement, post-placement retention support and assessment of healthcare needs.

The project's qualitative outcome goals for participants are (1) full-time job acquisition; (2) sustained employment with one or more employers; and (3) avoidance of criminal activity and re-incarceration.

Since 2006 New Careers has served over 300 clients: 166 clients participated in the three-phase New Careers core program 510 clients were provided with various services including life skills, job readiness, health education, healthcare referrals and job placement services but did not participate in the formal New Careers program 86 total job placements were brokered through New Careers Average wage of New Careers participants is $10.32/hour Only 12 participants returned to prison during the time they were engaged in the project

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Mission

New Career's mission is to help men and women recently released from state and federal prison who are returning to the greater Newark area to gain access to the healthcare, legal and social services they need to stabilize and obtain jobs. The project's strategic goals are to demonstrate a replicable, sustainable approach to aiding successful reentry and to catalyze reform of state and local reentry policy and practice.

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Model

The New Careers’ Project employs a providing daily productive structure, three-phase program design based on modest earnings, recent work history case management, transitional work while allowing the project staff to and job placement and post- observe participants’ job performance placement support. The underlying theory holds that formerly incarcerated individuals’ personal strengths and assets are best leveraged in a structured and supportive self-help community environment. Case managers individually assess participants’ needs and help them to set and achieve prioritized goals. Transitional work strengthens program engagement while providing daily productive structure, modest earnings, and recent work history while allowing the project staff to observe participants’ job performance and workplace comportment.

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Partnerships

- In 2007 New Careers partnered with the City of Newark to provide program participants with a temporary work experience called transitional jobs in light construction, landscaping, and maintenance on city property and in city buildings throughout Newark's neighborhoods.

This successful partnership continued when in 2008, the Department of Labor granted $2 million to the City of Newark for comprehensive prisoner reentry intervention. Through this grant, New Careers will provide temporary work experience, permanent job placement, and ongoing services for clients who have become employees and their employers.

- New Careers’ success depends upon its working relationships with a wide range of local service providers, including Integrity House, Newark Emergency Services for Families, Offender Aid and Restoration, Goodwill Industries, Prodigal Sons and Daughters, American Friends Service Committee, La Casa de Don Pedro, and Churches in Cooperation. Integrated as it is, New Careers’ community-linked approach is a testament to the power of local agencies working together for a common cause.

Furthermore, current and former partners in the New Careers Project are First Occupational Center of New Jersey (OCNJ) with additional active support from the Newark Alliance, New Jersey State Parole Board, New Jersey Department of Corrections, the Essex County and Newark Workforce Investment Boards, Newark Community Health Centers, New Community Corporation, Essex County College, and the Bridge to Recovery.

 

- Building Capacity: New Careers founded the Greater Essex County Reentry Providers Network in 2007 to establish standards and promote solutions-based approaches to improve the service array of providers throughout the greater Essex County Area. To find out more, click here

 

- Emphasis is placed on health education and facilitating access to medical care. In partnership with the City of Newark’s Department of Child and Family Wellbeing, Division of Medical Care services, project staff work with the City’s clinic staff to schedule routine health screenings for program participants. Project case managers coordinate with medical social workers at the clinic to ensure that any needed follow up care is provided.

 

- Participation in the New Careers program is strictly voluntary. However, the project works collaboratively with NJ Parole Board through local Parole District supervisors and individual parole officers. Parole officers refer parolees to the program and program staff issue periodic updates on their progress and status.

 

- Many prisoners are released from New Jersey State prisons with significant debt stemming from civil fines, criminal fines, motor vehicle insurance surcharges and child support judgments. New Careers staff assists program participants in identifying each of their obligations and connects them with ReLeSe and Legal Services of New Jersey for assistance with clearing warrants, obtaining manageable payment schedules, and child support modification when the individual cannot resolve these issues without assistance.

 

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The New Careers Program

Participants experience the program in three phases:

• Assessment/Goal Setting/Orientation & Enrollment

Case managers determine applicants’ suitability for project participation by assessing their strengths and needs. While the project emphasizes inclusiveness, the staff tries to avoid enrolling applicants whose immediate needs clearly outstrip the program’s resources and capacity. 

Case managers help new participants to identify and prioritize problem issues and develop strategies for addressing each issue individually. Individual service plans specify short-term and longer term goals that participants’ will pursue during their year of program involvement.

 

The program orientation is a series of short seminars, workshops, lectures and topic discussions conducted over 5 days. Topics include job search techniques, resume writing, job market trends & economic forecasts, career planning, health education, health care, lifelong education & personal development, family dynamics, the stigma of a criminal record and how to give an effective job interview.

 

• Transitional Work/Case Management/Job Coaching/Job Search

Participants are assigned to part-time, minimum wage jobs that last from 8 weeks. During this phase, case managers continue to support participants’ goals pursuit and the program’s Employment Specialist/Job Developer supervises and assists each participant’s job search until a job placement is made.

 

The transitional job work-week is either 3 days or 4 days. When not working at their job assignments, participants engage in job search activities and attend life skills workshops at the program site.  Life skills sessions address family relations, budgeting on a modest salary, conflict resolution and decision making.

• Job Placement/Job Coaching/Post Hire Follow Up & Support

After participants obtain permanent jobs the employment specialist and case managers follow up with them monthly to document their continued employment and offer support when needed. The project offers employee relations services to employers as a hiring incentive and to maximize job retention. The project follows clients for up to 12 months from the date of enrollment.

 

 

Why Prisoner Reentry Matters

 

People returning from prison confront both personal challenges and systemic challenges. Returnees typically return to urban communities destitute, with spotty work histories, few marketable skills, limited education, and the formidable stigma of a criminal record. They typically return evincing attitudes and behaviors that have helped them to survive street life and prison life but that work against them in the social and business mainstream. Many return to impoverished neighborhoods and overburdened families. It is common under current law and policy for people to return from prison facing thousands of dollars in debt resulting from criminal penalties, civil fines, motor vehicle insurance surcharges and child support arrears. New Jersey law also dictates the suspension of driver’s licenses as a collateral sanction for many criminal offenses. These factors can make the ascent to employment, self-sufficiency, dignity and respectability steep and arduous. The New Careers Project is a self-help community designed to give a hand up to people trying to make the ascent.

 

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New Career Calendar of Events

Coming soon...

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