Special to Wesson News
Copiah-Lincoln (Co-Lin) Community College has been awarded a $482,025 Workforce Inclusion grant from the Center for Workforce Inclusion, Inc. (Center). Almost ninety percent of this grant – originally from the U.S. Department of Labor – will provide temporary employment to no less than eighty low-income older Mississippians living in Adams, Amite, Claiborne, Copiah, Franklin, Jefferson, Lawrence, Lincoln, Pike, Simpson, Smith, Walthall and Wilkinson counties. These older adults will participate in the Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP), a cornerstone program of the Older Americans Act and the only federal job training program targeted exclusively to low-income, older job seekers.
In its 59th year, SCSEP promotes personal dignity and self-sufficiency through work. The training attained through SCSEP provides in-demand skills for older, unemployed, low-income Americans. The Center, a top-tier U.S. Department of Labor National Grantee of SCSEP, works through a network of local partners delivering career training programs for eligible fifty-plus-year-old workers across the United States. To date, the Center has helped more than 500,000 gain unsubsidized employment from the SCSEP program.
“Our long-term, local partners are a key to the strength of the Center and provide the systems to train older Americans into strategic advantage for employers across the country.” said Gary A. Officer, president and CEO of the Center for Workforce Inclusion. “We are very pleased to continue our support of Copiah-Lincoln Community College for the 52nd consecutive year.”
“SCSEP helps our community’s eligible 55+ job seekers learn new skills and refresh old ones when they are coming back into the workforce,” said Dr. Dewayne Middleton, president of Copiah-Lincoln Community College. “At their training sites, SCSEP job seekers help local community, faith-based and public agencies carry out their mission, such as St. Andrews Mission, Copiah-Jefferson Regional Library Systems, Boys and Girls Club, Copiah County Human Resource Agency, Jefferson County Board of Supervisors, WIN Job Centers, Aging Gracefully Community Center and a variety of other non-profit and government agencies. This grant from the Center is essential to our being able to deliver these vital workforce training services to our community.”
For more information about Co-Lin’s program, visit www.CenterForWorkforceInclusion.org.