Whitfield County One-Stop

The Dalton Department of Labor Field Service Office (FSO) is the newest One-Stop Shop/Career Depot in Northwest Georgia. Representatives from Adult Literacy, Dalton College, Family and Children Services, the Job Training Partnership Program (JTPA), New Connections to Work, Vocational Rehabilitation, and Vocational Transitions, Inc. have scheduled days and hours they will be at the Department of Labor Office.

Derita Ruff, Manager of the Dalton Labor office, spoke for all the agencies when she said she welcomes this opportunity to provide improved customer service for the residents of Northwest Georgia.@ She also noted that the collaboration was an excellent opportunity for staff to learn more about other agencies.

Welfare to Work Funds

The Northwest Georgia Private Industry has been awarded approximately $1.4 million dollars to provide services for welfare recipients in the fifteen-county Northwest Georgia service delivery area. Gwen Dellinger, JTPA Director, has met with the local Family and Children Services managers to determine needs and set priorities for expending funds.

For many welfare recipients, getting a job is not nearly as difficult as keeping one. The majority of welfare recipients are Acyclers@ who move between welfare dependence and employment in generally low-wage, temporary work. Job retention is the key to long-term self-sufficiency. NCFL

WtW Web Sites

White House Welfare Reform
www.whitehouse.gov/WH/Welfare/

U.S. Department of Justice
www.ins.usdoj.gov/hqopp/index.html

  Kudos for Fannin County Schools

The Fannin County High School in Blue Ridge, Georgia, is doing a stand-out job of preparing graduates for college. According to the Morris News Service, only 11 percent of their students attending Georgia public colleges needed remedial courses. This is the fourth best ranking out of all of Georgia's High Schools.

Congratulations to the students, teachers, and administrators of the Fannin County School System for a job well done.

Career Depot at Walker Tech

The Career Depot at Walker Tech now includes a four-county collaborative. The counties are Catoosa, Chattooga, Dade, and Walker. Meetings of the collaborative partners are scheduled for the first Thursday of each month. Meeting sites will be alternated among the participating agencies and organizations. The next meeting is scheduled for February 5, 1998, at the Department of Labor Office on Battlefield Parkway, Fort Oglethorpe. The meeting will start at 10:00 a.m.

One-Stop Grant

The Georgia Department of Labor has issued grant proposal information with details about local One-Stop project options. The deadline for submitting proposals is March 31, 1998. Funds will be available after local proposals have been submitted and approved by state staff. The Northwest Georgia area will have $84,000 available through September 30, 1998. The Private Industry Council, field service offices, Family and Children Services Offices, technical institutes, and Green Thumb must, at a minimum, be involved in each region=s one-stop system. Designated representatives for all partners of the local collaboration must support the proposed budget for the region and sign the grant application signature page. For more information you may contact Karen E. Howell at 706-624-1118 or e-mail Vandy88@aol.com.

Conferences & Workshops

Project Ideas: Following are a few of the training programs being offered by Project Ideas at Kennesaw, Georgia, through June: Career Assessment: Facilitating the Process, March 4-5;

SETA: The Southeastern Employment and Training Association (SETA) Conference and Annual Meeting will be held April 5-8, 1998, at the Crown Plaza in Nashville, Tennessee. The conferences always have well-known, national speakers in the areas of Workforce Development and the most up-to-date information and workshops on the changing workforce environment. For more information about SETA and the conference, write SETA, 2767 Westbury Drive, Tallahassee FL 32303, phone or fax (850) 562-2108 or visit their website at http://www.seta.org.

NAJA: The National Association of Job Training Assistance (NAJA) will hold its 16th annual conference in San Francisco, CA March 23 - 27, 1998 at the Cathedral Hill Hotel. The conference will include speakers from U.S. DoL. Workshops will include Program Requirements for Compliance & Improvement, Activity-Based Cost Allocation for One-Stops, Fee-for-Service Revenue Generation, Internal Controls for One-Stops, and many more. To register or for more information, contact NAJA at 1-800-747-NAJA or fax (707) 642-6262. Their snail mail address is NAJA, P.O. Box 221392, Sacramento CA 95822.

careerdepot.org

We added two employment sites to the Public Schools K-12 section. One is Georgia Public School Recruitment Services, http://www.doe.k12.ga.us/humanresources/psrecruit.html. This site include links to other employment resources. Thanks to Matthew Rodgers, Webmaster of the Georgia Department of Education sites, for forwarding the links.

Success Story
by Dianne Tate

Machelle Barnette came to North Metro Tech for training after being laid off from her job at Spring Town in Cartersville, Georgia. Machelle had worked at this job for thirteen years. Her job as a garment folder was a declining industry. She decided to be retrained on computers to be able to work in a front office job.
Machelle was eligible for the JTPA program and began her training in October 1995. She excelled in school, making the President's List every quarter she was in training. A number of her friends and co-workers were laid off from the same company. They also came to North Metro Tech for retraining. Because they were afraid of change and terrified of going back to school after so many years, they became a support group. They took classes together, went to lunch together, even cried together when one of the women's father passed away unexpectedly. It was truly inspirational to watch these women grow and still remain such good friends.

Machelle graduated in March 1997 with a diploma in Information and Office Technology and a certificate as a Word Processing Specialist. Her grade point average was 4.0, the highest average possible.

Machelle went to work in an attorney's office in Cartersville shortly after her training. She worked there for several months, gaining valuable experience. When a job became available at North Metro Tech in the financial aid office, Machelle applied and was immediately hired. She has been a valuable asset to this school ever since.

No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings.