Goodwill Industries - Vocational Services

Download the Vocational Services Fact Sheet by clicking here (front - back).

Goodwill Industries of Akron has been the leader in workforce development and vocational programs in the region for more than 77 years. The organization provides services in Summit, Portage, Medina, Ashland and Richland counties. The Vocational Services department of Goodwill is the organization’s flagship program continuing to help individuals prepare for, find and retain employment. Vocational Services operates on a referral basis from area agencies that assist individuals with physical, mental, social and other barriers to employment and on a fee for service basis with interested area employers who wish to acquire assessment and pre-employment testing services for current or prospective employees.

YEOW! Program

Youth Employment Opportunities to Work!

The goals of the program are to prevent homelessness when released from foster care, provide employment training, encourage job retention and teach money management skills. The program will allow foster youth to obtain and maintain community-based employment.
See a brochure here (front - inside).

The need for this program surfaced after the April 2, 2004, Human Service Forum when guest speaker Judge Judy Hackett, a national advocate for youth and an author, stated that youth who matriculated out of foster care did not have the tools necessary for self sufficiency and that too many of them returned to the families or situations from which they had been removed. Further research revealed through a University of Chicago study released in 2002 that youth aging out of foster care earn significantly less than youth in any of the comparison groups both prior to and after their eighteenth birthday. Read more here.