Planning for the future may seem like a far-off task for most teens. Boys Town recognizes the pivotal turning point from adolescence to adulthood and provides the necessary education for youth to succeed in life. As part of an ongoing effort, James Hill, BTNY’s development director, recently worked with the Young Leader Council’s volunteer committee to set up a monthly career day for youth.

Since starting the project, Hill has hosted a career day every month, including an assortment of guest speakers from numerous industries.

Every year, hundreds of troubled youth, ages 10 to 18, find help through Boys Town Intervention and Assessment Homes in New York. Many suffer from a variety of emotional and behavioral problems, and they often have the misconception that they don’t have anything in common with the business community.

With this in mind, Hill begins each career day with a networking/ice-breaker game to ease the students’ apprehension. While they enjoy pizza, the guest speakers and youth have a mission: walk around, meet three people they have never met before and find out three things they have in common with each new person. It’s a great way for the youth to make connections with speakers from different industries, such as construction, insurance, sales, business, the arts and fashion design.

After the attendees finish their pizza, they move to a Q & A session with an informal panel of three to four professionals who answer simple questions about their career paths.

Brian Josephs, a recent speaker, said his three favorite things about speaking to the youth included the opportunity to get them to think about their futures, helping them build confidence through networking and helping them learn the valuable life skill of hand-writing thank-you cards.