Hostos Continuing Education & Workforce Development
The Skills To Do The Job As the Spring 2014 semester draws near, I want to share with you some of our remarkable achievements in Fall 2013. The semester started out with a bang. Our adult student registrations in both our long-standing and new courses exceeded our expectations, indicating that we are meeting our goal of providing job training and career building opportunities to increasing numbers of New York City residents. It also signifies that we are helping more individuals to improve the quality of their lives and become more socially mobile. In Fall 2013, we also won several New York State-wide awards. Let me begin by mentioning the one award of which we are most proud—The Charles A. Burns Outstanding Adult Continuing Education Student Award from the Continuing Education Association of New York (CEANY). This award was given to Ruby Bryan for achieving excellence by demonstrating persistence, drive and success in overcoming obstacles to achieve her educational goals. When Ruby left her home in the Island of Jamaica as a young woman, she had to adjust to a new country, culture and new way of earning a living. Having worked as a Home Health Aide when she arrived, she quickly moved to complete a Certified Nursing Assistant Program and earn her LPN and RN at Hostos. She accomplished all of this by age 61 despite medical and other personal difficulties and working full-time from 11:00pm to 7:00am. During this time, she managed to take care of her family needs, raised children, several grandchildren and remained an active member of her church, cooking for and feeding the homeless. As you can see, Ruby is a great role model for all of us. I am also pleased to announce that we received three other awards from CEANY:
. Outstanding New Continuing Education Professional of the Year: Fern Chan . Exemplary Credit Program Award: Hostos Career Path Community Health Worker Certificate Program
. Exemplary Course Catalogue / Brochure: CUNY in the Heights, “The Celebration of Education” In addition, we were able to successfully implement our new certificate programs—Enrolled Agent, Home Health Aide, Culinary Arts and Fund Raising. As we have done in the past, we developed these programs in line with employer and industry demands. Many of our programs now include instruction with hands-on experience, internships and clinical practicums. Moreover, we enhanced our comprehensive support services related to social services, job placement, mentoring and career counseling by expanding what we do for veterans. Through our relationships with outside organizations, we offer individualized support services for our veteran students’ needs, be it housing, financial assistance, legal advice, career counseling, job placement, outpatient programs, peer mentoring and disability services. Hostos Community College is committed to keeping our veterans in school from enrollment through employment. We are just as committed to this goal for all of our students. This Spring, let the staff at Hostos Continuing Education & Workforce Development guide you in your job training and career building decisions. Call or visit us and let us help you get the skills to do the job! Sincerely, Peter Mertens, Interim Assistant Dean Division of Continuing Education & Workforce Development