Employment Readiness Helps Women Get Back on their Feet

By Heather Caygle

Pathways is not just a shelter for homeless women and children. At Pathways, we help get women on their feet and keep them there. One of the ways we do that is by offering the Employment Readiness Program.

Pathways guests participating in a recent
Employment Readiness class.

During Employment Readiness, two volunteers from the Junior League of Birmingham meet with homeless women eight times over two weeks. The classes, which last 1.5 hours, cover a range of job-related skills, including resume writing, cover letters and mock interviews. The evening classes have been so successful that in August Pathways began offering the program on a rotating basis during the day to visitors of the agency's Day Center.

So what is the class really like? I went behind the scenes during Pathways' latest Employment Readiness session to find out.

Employment Readiness is:

• Educational: On the first day, women dive right in by taking a quiz focused on resume basics. Each day the women learn about a different work-related skill. Day two covers resume writing (do’s and don’ts, buzz words to use and formatting). Day four focuses on job applications (including common mistakes made). Day seven is all about mock interviews (complete with proper interview attire). Other topics covered include how to write a cover letter, where to look for jobs and how to build self-esteem. 

“Learning to construct a resume is something I’ve always had trouble with," said Strawberry, one of the women who participated in the Employment Readiness Program. "I’m so happy because ever since high school, I’ve always wanted a resume that looked like this and now I have it.”  

Pathways' Program Director Dawn Mitchell, right,
works with an Employment Readiness student on her
 personal plan for seeking employment.

• Heartfelt: It isn’t just resume writing and mock interviews. Over the course of two weeks, the women really grow closer. Each day, laughs are shared and personal stories are revealed. On the last day of class, smiles and hugs went all around. At the end, Ashley, one of the teachers, was even holding one woman’s baby girl, bottle-feeding her. Soon after, the baby, still in Ashley’s arms, let out a big burp.  

• Eye Opening: Many things people take for granted often pose obstacles to homeless women. “What address will I use?” “What if I didn’t finish college or high school?” “I haven’t had a job in years. How do I put that on my resume?” Those were all issues that teachers Lauren and Ashley helped the women solve.

• Honest: Women at Pathways come from many different situations. Just in this class alone there were women that had worked in many different jobs, including as a substitute teacher, at the Red Cross, as a telemarketer, a nursing assistant and a security guard. The 15 women in this class all had different life stories and backgrounds but were all hoping for one thing—to get back on their feet. The class works because, even with all their differences, there is an abundance of honesty and respect.

At the end of the two-week session, the women walked out of that classroom not only with several copies of a properly formatted resume, but with their heads held high and their hearts hopeful.

A group of women proudly show off their certificates of
 completion from Pathways' Employment Readiness Program.

Heather Caygle is a public relations graduate from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. She  spent the summer working with Pathways.

Hopelessness to Hope

By Carolyn Johnson

Photo credit: Ryan on Flickr

Admirable accomplishments. Those of us at Pathways see them over and over with the success of our clients. We witness the plight of our guests, the defeating, life-changing trauma of losing a home, running out of personal resources, and lack of support from family and friends. This can lead to desperate calls to shelters for a bed.

Many times in our society, when we hear about the courage and determination of ordinary people, it becomes the talk of the "water cooler" crowd. We hear about it on the news, it becomes a featured in-depth story on shows like 20/20.

There are many stories of great accomplishments at Pathways, but are few are made public and given much fanfare.

For example, 64-year-old Lydia tells us of her overwhelming fear of her family and friends discovering that “she is a failure by living in a shelter”. Lydia worked hard to keep her secret. She would make excuses to leave a social event with friends to get back to the shelter in time for curfew. She had to sell most of her belongings to stay afloat prior to entering shelter. Lydia had been a nurse in another state and came to Birmingham to help her aging and ill mother. This situation did not work out. There were family problems coming from all directions, and Lydia left that situation. She then had a stroke, and other medical problems began to pile on. She believed the important things in her life were lost forever.

Lydia was encouraged by and somewhat challenged to redirect her well-honed skill of determination to conceal her homeless plight from friends and family. She was challenged to look forward so she could move forward. She landed a part-time job in the home health field that matched her skill set. She received budgeting assistance, saved money, worked on the relationship with her family, and recruited a few friends to help her collect furniture items in a storage she obtained. Lydia was now planning ahead, preparing for her exit from the program. I began to have fewer visits from her in my office. She had gained her own sense of hope.

Lydia used her time wisely and worked hard to pull her “new life” together. She told me before she left that she feared being happy, because for so long she believed she was not allowed to feel. Coming to the shelter offered her a fresh start, but she also was afraid that she could not do it alone and would once again fail.

Just like many of our clients who work hard against feeling hopeless, I had to remind Lydia that the trick is not to fight against hopelessness but to fight for hope. It is up to her to choose which door to open.

There are many courageous women who overcome “the bad” in their life. Women who are determined to move forward, to have faith in a spiritual sense as well as in themselves. Women with stories of hope, where confidence grows within them, where problems become redefined as challenges, and failure becomes a victory.

These are huge events like an amputee climbing Mount Everest or a woman who went from getting food stamps to becoming one of the most successful authors of our time by writing the Harry Potter Series.

These are truly great examples of how we can do it with a great deal of patience and determination.

Photo Credit: Leonardo on Flikr.

Carolyn Johnson is a social worker at Pathways.

UAB Nursing Students Help Homeless Women Unwind

By Janis Evans

Homeless women who visited Pathways' Day Center on September 1
were  pampered with manicures courtesy of UAB nursing students.

Take a moment and close your eyes. Think about all of things that cause you to be stressed. Now, open your eyes and take a deep breath and close them again. This time, imagine that you have no care in the world. In fact, you are walking down the beach, the waves are touching your feet, and the water is perfectly fine.

UAB nursing instructor Sharon Hamilton
demonstrates a stress-relieving technique.

Many people who encounter stress are taught how to manage their stress. The techniques mentioned above are a few stress relieving exercises. However, what do you do when your entire living situation is a stressor? You are not given the option to walk down the beach. How do you manage the stress of life?

On September 1, nursing students from the University of Alabama at Birmingham visited Pathways and addressed this very topic to homeless women visiting the agency’s Day Center.

The students began their health talk by defining stress. They identified common stress factors, triggers, and when stress is most likely to occur in women. They showed how stress can be good and bad and explained to the guests how to deal with stress.

UAB nursing students explain to Pathways'
guests different to cope with stress.

The presentation concluded with an open discussion, which allowed Day Center guests to ask questions, give personal examples, and share their personal tips on how to deal with life’s stressors.

A UAB nursing students treats a Pathways guest to a manicure.

After the presentation, the UAB students eased some of the guests’ stress by treating them to manicures. “Sometimes it feels nice to be pampered!” said Sharon Hamilton, the students’ instructor.

Janis Evans is the Volunteer Coordinator and Development Assistant at Pathways. She can be reached at janis@pathwayshome.org.

Struggling with addiction

By Carolyn Hogan

Photo credit: Sara Robertson on Flickr

Dee came to Pathways in April 2010. She was an energetic, petite white female that had “personality”. Dee was every bit of 100 pounds, wet with sand in her pocket. She stayed at an emergency shelter at night and, as other clients usually do, came to Pathways' Day Center for day services. These services  include  a hot shower, laundry facilities, use of client phones, food, life-skill classes, referral services, and an area to relax and get out of the elements. 

Dee never met a stranger and would give anyone her last penny. But after a month or so, something strange began to happen. Dee’s crystal personality became cloudy and grim. She had been hanging out with a crowd of ladies who always complained and caused trouble with night staff at other local shelters. When I would pull Dee off to the side to talk, she seemed happy and okay. But she was definitely not the same person. As time passed, I found that this crowd was hooked on prescription drugs and would sometimes fake illnesses to obtain their “fix”. This all became too apparent when Dee came into the Day Center one day, staggering and complaining of headaches and dizziness. After about a half hour, she fell out of a chair. The paramedics were called, but they couldn’t find anything wrong with her. Because of her stated symptoms, they took her to the hospital. Later that day, Dee returned, feeling better and complete with two new prescriptions. And the games began.

Dee and her friends were eventually put out of shelters and boarding homes but somehow managed to put together enough money to get a room at a nearby motel.  Sometimes, Dee would call Pathways for help, crying and saying “they’re not my friends”. Other times she called a friend for support, only to be left on the side of the road. Dee’s only alternative was to call for support from her family. Pathways assisted her in contacting her sister, who was sympathetic but declined to take Dee in. This was when I found that Dee had been through six recovery programs only to leave with the promise to start over. Her family seemed to have lost  hope. 

Pathways did not give up on Dee. Together, she and I cried and prayed, and she asked God and her family for forgiveness and a new start. Then, Dee received a phone call from her sister, who had found a recovery program in Tennessee. The fees were waived, and Dee seemed to be on the path to her new start.

But to my surprise, a week later I looked up and saw Dee standing in front of me. She had managed to wiggle out of going to treatment - again.

However, this time, she had managed to stay clean long enough to be eligible to return to one of Birmingham's area shelters. Maybe this was the new start. She initiated an approach to set new goals with her social worker and enrolled in classes at Fellowship House. After attending classes on a regular basis, she was given first choice for the next in-house program slot. She has since graduated into the next level, acquired housing and independence.

To make this long story short, I consider this a huge success for someone who dared to take advantage of her second - or rather third - chance. At last sight, Dee had gained at least 90 pounds and wears a smile that is contagious.

Carolyn Hogan is the Day Center Coordinator at Pathways.