Dear SWP parents, I want to start by thanking all of you for your engagement and participation so far. Our communication has been great, and you have been responding to my requests promptly, thank you. The program kickoff took place on Tuesday, June 21, 2022, with training at New Tech High School. At training day, the youth had the opportunity to meet their respective mentors and received all the information, materials, and uniforms needed for the program. The mentors and other presenters worked with the youth on various activities including a financial literacy workshop, Nicasa Teen Court mock trial, team building and leadership exercises, and reviewing the employee handbook. We would like to thank Nicasa, Community Partners for Affordable Housing and Chris Kubic, Zion Benton Township High School social studies teacher and community leader, for such great presentations. Also, thank you to New Tech High School for letting us use their space. Twenty-eight youth were hired and each of them went through an application and interview process. Seven out of the 28 were placed at Zion-Benton Public Library, Zion Assessor’s office and Zion Township Supervisor’s office. The rest of the youth were placed in a maintenance crew. The Zion Township staff worked hard to plan and coordinate the program. Each staff member took the lead at some capacity to coordinate for Parent Orientation, interviews, Training Day, job placements, and the curriculum for the program. We hired great mentors and they are coaching, teaching, mentoring, and showing the youth the ins and outs of employment and helping develop leadership and citizenship skills. Mr. Rod Henry has been a SWP mentor for about 10 years and is the mentor’s lead. Mr. Henry has been a great asset to the program. The new addition to the team is Mr. Cameron Bridges. He is a ZB graduate and is eager to learn the program and to work with the youth.
NEWSLETTER July 1, 2022 WEEK 1 & 2 2022 SESSION – ISSUE 1
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PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Youth waiting to be interviewed Client Services Coordinator, Grace Gamboa takes youth picture for their program ID
2022 Summer Work Program Group Parent Orientation
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Training Day: Team Building Activity
Community Partners for Affordable Housing Financial Literacy Session Community Partners for Affordable Housing (CPAH), HUD Certified Counselors, Janina Hall and Laura Olvera, provided a financial literacy presentation geared towards teenagers to develop good financial habits that will hopefully help enable them to successfully make, manage, multiply and protect their hard-earned money. Topics covered were: Earning, budgeting, spending, borrowing and savings goals. Each youth were provided with some bank swag from a partner lender, Wintrust Mortgage, which included sunglasses, a note pad and other goodies.
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ZBTHS Social Studies Teacher Chris Kubic Teambuilding Activities
ZBTHS social studies teacher and community leader Chris Kubic lead some teambuilding activities for the Summer Work Program. Students learned about how their personality Kanno allow them to work best with other people, and then they worked together to build a structure out of noodles and marshmallows.
They tried to beat their best time passing a ball around the circle using different strategies introduced by different team members, and they played the blindfold pool noodle whacker game, which is as fun as it sounds! Good luck to the students this summer for a productive and fun experience!
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Nicasa Behavioral Health Services Teen Court & Mock Trails Nicasa Behavioral Health Services, talked to the youth about “Teen Court”. Teen Court is an alternative to the traditional justice system for first time youth offenders ages 10 – 18. Teen Court sentences are determined by a volunteer jury of teen peers. The primary goal of Teen Court is to attempt to instill accountability and responsibility. As an interactive experience, the youth had the opportunity to part in a mock trail. Youth had the opportunity to be the offender, jury, attorney, and judge. They had a case and had to follow through with it from the begin to the end. Youth will have the opportunity to volunteering after they complete the program.
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Interview Soft Skills Zion Township’s Client Workforce Coordinator, Amy Onan and Business Manager, Sandra Usher conducted an Interview Soft Skills session. In the session, observations and feedback from the youth’s interview were discussed along with how the process works for the program. Also, it was discussed how the process will work when they apply for jobs in the future. Mock interviews were presented and got the youth participating doing their own mock interviews.
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Upcoming SWP Events • • •
July 5 – Feed My Starving Children 7:45 am – 12:00 pm July 21 – Youth Summit 8:00 am – 4:15 pm July 29 – Youth ONLY year-end celebration 11:30 am – 1:00 pm
Upcoming Community Events Zinnias for Zion Coloring contest - Entries due July 30th at participating locations. Winners will be announced at
the Zion Together Days Monarch Mania Event. o Pick up pages at locations listed below § Zion-Benton Public Library – 2400 Gabriel Ave § Culver’s – 3335 Sheridan Rd Zion Together Days (Zion Park District Bandshell) – 2400 Dowie Memorial Dr. • August 4 – Concert in the Park featuring “The Lloyd Stephens Band” @7pm • August 5 – Movie in the Park featuring Encanto @8:15pm (bring your blankets/chair) • August 6 – Community Clean up @2771 Galilee Ave 8am – 12pm • August 7 – Monarch Mania @ Shiloh Blvd & Elisha Ave 1 pm – 5pm § § § § § § §
Training Day Weekly Assessment: Respect & Integrity Adopt-A-Highway Street Cleaning Wood chips/weeding at community parks Scraped and painted picnic tables at the Park District locations Interview Soft Skills
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