Our Employment Program supports programs that help low-income adults build the skills and knowledge needed for lasting success in the workplace. The strongest programs focus on helping individuals get and keep good jobs with career ladders and employer-sponsored benefits. The Cara Program stands out for its ability to help hard-to-employ individuals develop the skills they need to obtain full-time jobs in growing industry sectors that offer important benefits such as health care. Once a person is employed, the Cara Program provides ongoing support to help individuals stay employed in the same job for at least a year. This commitment has put hundreds of adults in a better position to support themselves and their families.

Transformation. In a word, that is the goal the Cara Program has achieved in literally thousands of lives in the past 16 years. Lives like Leonard Ward's.

In May of 2006,Ward was a 50-year-old ex-offender struggling with three decades of drug addiction. He had not been employed full time since 1996. His prison record, for a series of nonviolent drug-related offenses, combined with a spotty employment history and a lack of job-related skills made finding work nearly impossible. "If it hadn't been for Cara, I know I would have become complacent and made some stupid choices," he recalls.

The Cara Program provides a bridge to full-time employment for Ward and 200 other individuals annually. Participants of its 12-week structured employment-training program start each day with inspirational "Motivations" sessions. During these energetic sessions, individuals share challenges and obstacles that they have overcome to motivate others to transform their lives. Ward acknowledges coming to the Cara Program with a significant chip on his shoulder. The unrelenting positive attitude among Cara Program students and staff had a powerful impact.

"Within a couple of weeks, I started feeling better about myself, and that transformation on the inside led to some dramatic change in behavior."

The 12-week program also includes life skills classes and specialized training in computer operations, health care, banking, manufacturing, hospitality, or office services. Cara targets these particular employment areas because they offer full-time, entry-level opportunities and higher-than-average starting salaries. That translated to starting wages that averaged more than $11 an hour plus benefits for those who became employed last year."We're talking about real jobs, with real benefits, and that means real success in peoples' lives," says Eric Weinheimer, Cara's executive director.

In addition to specialized training and internships offered through corporate partners, such as Chase and Pitney Bowes, the agency has developed its own enterprise that offers adults such as Ward a chance to build a work history. Cleanslate, a neighborhood beautification business, provides work experience for men and women who find it hard to secure employment, often due to a recent history of incarceration. In two years, Employment Cleanslate has grown from working in one neighborhood to eight, and is helping to revitalize the neighborhoods it serves.

Ward finished at the top of his training group at Cleanslate and secured a full-time position on the custodial staff at the Museum of Science and Industry. He has held this job for more than a year and has earned glowing performance reviews. His transformation is impressive and is one of hundreds the Cara Program can point to with great pride.Weinheimer credits his agency's success to productive relationships with more than 80 communitybased organizations and dozens of corporate partners."We can't serve our mission of helping people transform their lives through real, permanent employment if we don't meet the needs of these stakeholders," he says. Cara has helped about 2,000 men and women obtain permanent employment since 1991. Nearly threefourths of those graduates remain employed in the same job one year later. This is a level of success rarely attained in the workforce development field.

More than a year later,Ward still stops in to participate in Motivations sessions once or twice a week. The Cara Program's ongoing support has been invaluable. "I live in a furnished apartment today, and I have some savings in the bank," he says. "That may not seem like a lot, but to me, it's a miracle."