YouthWorks Creates Leadership Opportunities for Young Workers
In 2023, nearly 7,900 Baltimore City youth applied to YouthWorks to gain summer employment experience, and some 500 businesses, agencies and nonprofits signed on to meet this demand.
The program — founded 50 years ago — operates out of the Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Employment Development and receives funding from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. It is unique in that it guarantees every qualifying applicant — Baltimore City youth between the ages of 14 to 21 — at least five weeks of summer employment.
Baltimore Youth Leaders in Action
Beyond connecting young people to work experience, YouthWorks has also prioritized placing more participants in leadership roles.
“Not only have we offered more than 80,000 summer jobs to young people in Baltimore City in the past 10 years, we are also helping them gain leadership skills and work experience that will prepare them for lifelong careers,” says YouthWorks’ Senior Program Manager S. Rasheem. “Our primary focus is preparing the next generation of workers to succeed in the labor market. To do that, they need to have a seat at the table.”
Having a seat at the table gives young people a chance to use their voices to shape both YouthWorks and the Baltimore City employment ecosystem. Current opportunities include:
- The Youth Advisory Council, which hires 10 youth to help shape the creation, design and implementation of YouthWorks programming.
- The Core Council is geared toward youth who are interested in careers in government or public service.
- YouthWorks Continuous Improvement Tool, which offers young people a venue for sharing their perspectives and aids businesses in identifying and developing meaningful summer employment experiences.
- YouthWorks’ YouTube channel, featuring videos created by and for youth on a variety of early employment topics, such as building a personal budget or filling out income tax forms.
- The Youth Leaders Internship Program, supported by the Baltimore Workforce Development Board’s Youth Committee, engages 10 city residents ages 16 to 24. These youth — called Youth Intern Leaders — leverage their experiences to advance the committee’s work on youth employment.
Thomas Moore, a former Youth Advisory Council member who is an incoming first-year student at Calvert Hall College, calls YouthWorks a great experience for young people who want to help their community. “I really liked how structured the program was and how involved youth can be,” says Moore. “Being on the Youth Advisory Council helped me better understand the perspectives of other young people when it comes to the problems we face in Baltimore.”
Fall and Spring Internships
On July 10, 2023, young Baltimoreans will begin their summer jobs with YouthWorks. When school resumes, the program will support 200 internships for high school juniors and seniors in the Baltimore City Public School system. These internships, offered in fall 2023 and spring 2024, will enable students to continue building their early career experience and critical job skills while also earning a paycheck beyond the summer break.
Discover how YouthWorks went virtual during the COVID-19 pandemic
