Tech program offers help for women of color
County provides $4.5M for workforce training
More local leaders are stepping up to help people of color enter the technology industry.
In early March, the Franklin County Board of Commissioners announced a $4.5 million investment in the new Tech Women of Color workforce training initiative.
Funded with American Resource Plan Act dollars, the program is the result of a partnership between the Franklin County Department of Job and Family Services and Per Scholas, a national tech training nonprofit, which has a branch in Columbus.
The free, 15-week course will kick off in July and ultimately educate 200 women of color in cohorts through August 2024. Prospective students can fill out an interest form at perscholas.org/columbus.
Graduates will receive supportive services as they face the “benefits cliff,” which occurs when workers lose public assistance benefits after a small pay increase.
“Over the last two years, I've heard women with children tell me face to face, ‘I'm having to do things I'm not proud of because I can't take a raise,'” said Joy Bivens, who is the deputy county administrator for health and human services. “We came together with collective partners to develop a training that would significantly impact women in the IT space, so they wouldn't necessarily have to make those hard decisions.”
Since February 2020, women have lost over 5.4 million net jobs, accounting for 55 percent of overall net job loss,
according to a 2021 report by the National Women's Law Center. And unemployment rates have been disproportionately higher for women of color amid the pandemic.
Tech Women of Color will teach students IT fundamentals, which will prepare them for entry-level jobs. According to Per Scholas, graduates should be expected to make $18 to $19 per hour on average, and begin a career path to greater earnings.
“People don't want to be on assistance for a long period of time,” said Franklin County Commissioner Erica Crawley. “It is supposed to be a bridge. This workforce development program is a great way for us to be using taxpayer dollars because when we help people get back into the workforce, that doesn't do anything but put money right back into our economy.”
The program will be a hybrid of virtual and in-person sessions at Per Scholas, which is currently located on Jefferson Avenue Downtown. But the nonprofit is planning to move to a new building in the near future.
Per Scholas Columbus Managing Director Noah Mitchell said the partnership with Franklin County is a “dream.”
“We're really thankful for their initial investment in this process,” he said. “They have been incredible. We've been doing this specifically in Columbus for over 10 years, and we've seen the impact that it can have on individuals' lives. We believe that tech is a really powerful way for folks to restart their careers and to have a thriving wage.”
Mitchell also said he hopes to see a tech sector that is as diverse as its customers. In 2019, women of color only made up 11% of the computing and mathematical workforce, with Black women accounting for just 3%, according to a National Center For Women & Information Technology study.
As part of the program, participants also will receive executive mentoring, financial coaching, paid internships and job placement.
“Support is a really big part of our process,” Mitchell said. “I think it's what actually separates us from a traditional bootcamp. We believe in helping to launch careers, which we recognize is going to take more than 15 weeks.”
Crawley said an initiative like Tech Women of Color would have helped her when she was a young mother struggling to find a job after leaving the military.
“I didn't find any positions,” she said. “I was on assistance. I'm just like these women who wanted to work. I was just looking for an opportunity. It would've made a difference for me. And that's why I'm excited because I know it will make a difference for our neighbors.”
Preparing women of color for tech jobs is especially important as Intel plans to open two computer chip factories in New Albany. But Crawley also stressed that there are current local companies that need staff right away.
“Employers cannot wait for people to go back to school and be reskilled and upskilled,” she said. “They need people who can get industry-recognized credentials (quickly) and then they can hit the ground running. I just want to highlight that we are being responsive to the employers that we have in Franklin County, but also making sure that our neighbors can lift themselves up and not have a handout, but a hand up.” ethompson@dispatch.com @miss_ethompson