Boys Town New York

Students Explore the Possibilities at Career Day

The window of opportunity is wide open for children at Boys Town New York. They learned what their futures could hold during the Willoughby Street School's first Career Day.

Youth from every program attended workshops on careers in everything from fashion to finance, carpentry to computers, police work to ministry, as well as many others. For the youth, it was a time to hear from and interact with members of the community, and to explore paths they might not have considered available to them.

"I want to start a mentoring and educational program for street kids," said Michael, an 18-year-old youth in the Long-Term Residential Program. "This career day gave me more information on how I can make that happen."

Youth began the day with a non-profit panel led by Trish Tchume of www.idealist.org/Actions Without Borders, which included representatives from the Childrens Museum of the Arts, Housing Works Inc., and Karen Pereira de Andrade, Boys Town New York Bergen Street Shelter Program Director.

"We do these programs at many high schools throughout the city," said Tchume, "and this was one of the most engaged, interested groups of children we've gotten to work with."

Learning about careers helped the children know that the future is bright, thanks to the help, healing and hope found at Boys Town.