Summer Works jobs change futures
Kiabeth Pagan had just turned 11 years old when her father lost his mechanic job and her parents split up. Her mother packed her and her younger siblings up and moved them from Lawrence to a shelter in Mattapan.
It was a surreal time, Kiabeth recalled yesterday, but things got better. Kiabeth’s mother eventually got a job and an apartment for her and her children.
Through it all, Action for Boston Community Development, a nonprofit that helps the city’s poorest, was there to help, offering fuel assistance, food, turkeys at Thanksgiving and giving Kiabeth a job through its SummerWorks program.
That first summer, Kiabeth was a camp counselor at the Dorchester Neighborhood Service Center. Those paychecks, she told me, made her feel successful and accomplished. She was able to buy her school uniform and a new backpack. She gave her mother money for bills.
“Having so much money felt really good, to be able to provide for my family and provide for myself,” said Kiabeth, now 17 and a senior at Brighton’s Mary Lyon Pilot High School.
At Fenway Park tomorrow, ABCD will host its biggest annual fundraiser for SummerWorks, called “Field of Dreams,” now in its 21st year.
As of yesterday, 15 teams had signed up, including Boston Children’s Hospital and Partners HealthCare, forking over big bucks to play softball at the storied ballpark. Every cent raised goes towards a summer job for a teen in desperate need of one.
Last year, the event raised nearly $450,000 for Sum merWorks, which gives teens a sixweek, minimumwage job. They work in government offices, day care centers and with Boston police, to name a few. They start next week.
John Drew, longtime president and CEO of ABCD, hopes the fundraiser will raise enough money for about 400 summer jobs. All told, he hopes to offer jobs to 800 teens. The number of summer jobs has declined as the minimum wage rises, he said.
More and more homeless kids are looking for summer work, Drew added, and the program gives opportunities to some great kids who can’t find jobs in their struggling neighborhoods.
“We will put a lot of youngsters to work and they will then have a great experience helping their community,” said Drew. “More importantly, they’re off the streets.”
Kiabeth plans to work at DNSC again this summer through SummerWorks. “I look forward to it all school year long,” she said. “I feel really safe there and I feel really loved and appreciated.”
She’ll be at Fenway tomorrow. “These kids’ futures are changing dramatically through these jobs and through ABCD,” Kiabeth said. “It’s changing people’s lives, just how it changed mine, and not just my life individually, but my family.”