CEO Updates
CEO Updates: Pre-Apprenticeship Graduations for New York State
On December 13, 2023, Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO) celebrated two pre-apprenticeship graduations in both Buffalo and New York City. The classes are pathways to high-paying union careers in construction free of cost to justice-impacted individuals.
Read the storyCEO Updates: The Power of Reentry: Returning Strong
Today, CEO officially launches Returning Strong, a campaign calling for a new, collective narrative about reentry that rejects the stigma associated with system involvement and instead amplifies the talent, heart and voice of the people we serve all across the country.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Meet Chris Watler, CEO's New Executive Vice President
We are thrilled to announce that Christopher Watler has been appointed to the newly created position of Executive Vice President (EVP) of CEO. This promotion is a recognition of the leadership that Chris has displayed at CEO for over six years, along with some new responsibilities added to his portfolio.
Read the storyCEO Updates: CEO’s Impact! 2022: What We Did Together
What an incredible year it’s been at the Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO)! We are so grateful for your support. Check out CEO’s Impact! to learn more about what we achieved together this year.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Beloved Benefit, headlined by Usher and Maroon 5, raised $6.3 million, CEO is one of eight recipient organizations
The Beloved Benefit, a community impact event that galvanizes the city of Atlanta, aims to inspire positive change through greater economic mobility.
Read the storyCEO Updates: CEO honored as a beneficiary at Atlanta’s Beloved Benefit– featuring Usher and Maroon 5
Center for Employment Opportunities is thrilled to be a beneficiary of the 2022 Beloved Benefit in Atlanta! The Beloved Benefit is an annual gathering to support organizations promoting equity and building strong, healthy communities in Atlanta.
Read the storyCEO Updates: CEO continues Grow with Google partnership to provide digital skills training
Today, CEO was thrilled to host Grow With Google at our Oakland location to announce the expansion of their career readiness program for justice-Impacted communities. CEO will scale digital skills training into our job-readiness programming at all 31 locations.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Effectively Reaching Young Adult Job Seekers with Prior Justice Involvement
The Center for Employment Opportunities (CEO) and our partners launched a Credible Messenger Initiative (CMI) in 2017 as part of a broader strategy to improve services for justice-involved young adults in CEO's NYC workforce development program. The initiative paired young adult participants with full-time mentors who shared similar lived experiences to build trust and connection and to support them throughout their participation in CEO’s program.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Meeting The Need: How CEO Has Responded to COVID
The impact of COVID-19 on the health and economic stability of every American is unprecedented, and justice-impacted people are among those most affected, particularly in low-income communities of color from which so many currently incarcerated people come. As our state continues to respond, CEO is active in the community offering employment and training to those returning home from incarceration. Through CEO’s transitional jobs program, participants have been on the front lines providing essential work to their communities.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Injustice for Breonna Taylor and Many More in Kentucky's Legal System
Breonna Taylor was murdered by the police in her own home, and last week we learned that no police officers will be held criminally responsible. Attorney General Cameron presented limited charges and the grand jury only indicted one officer for wanton endangerment, alleging only that he shot blindly into a neighbor’s home during the raid. This is not only a failure of police officers to do their jobs effectively– it is a failure of the very institutions and laws that are supposed to keep community members safe.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Jobs for Economic Recovery Act: A Necessary Tool for Returning Citizens Seeking Employment
The Center for Employment Opportunities applauds the introduction of the Jobs for Economic Recovery Act by Senators Baldwin, Wyden, Bennet, Booker, and Van Hollen. If passed by Congress, the measure would provide jobs to unemployed and underemployed individuals, including those returning home from incarceration facing multiple barriers to work in an economy severely affected by COVID-19.
Read the storyCEO Updates: The need for local leaders to protect and expand rights for returning citizens
The Center for Employment Opportunities stands in outrage over the murder of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and the countless other Black men and women who’ve lost their lives to police brutality and racial violence. We strongly affirm Black Lives Matter. Our nation cannot move forward until our institutions and leaders come to terms with the fact that racism is a defining characteristic of our justice system.
Read the storyCEO Updates: CEO Responds During COVID-19: Federal Policy Recommendations
The COVID-19 crisis is challenging both our civic structures and our values. As the effects of the sustained economic downturn become further entrenched, those who struggle to access opportunity even in the best of times will undoubtedly bear a disproportionate burden. We have already seen how this crisis has exposed the fault lines of our nation’s inequalities. Communities of color in particular have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 as a result of historic inequities in housing, access to health care and employment. Black Americans are incarcerated at five times the rate of white Americans. If we are to address the needs of COVID-19-impacted communities, it is essential that we account for the people released from incarceration, many of whom will return to low-income communities that are now dealing with record levels of unemployment.
Read the storyCEO Updates: Constituent Voice
Constituent Voice (CV) is a strategic effort at CEO to solicit and respond to participant feedback. CV, combined with CEO’s strong performance management and evaluation work, supports increased impact and participant satisfaction. Given Constituent Voice’s central role at CEO, all levels of management engage with client feedback and work to adapt our approach based on that feedback.
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CEO Updates: Policy and Advocacy at CEO
Over the past year CEO has created a new Policy Department that will build upon the strength of our program and push for structural reforms to improve the lives of people coming home from incarceration. Working across all 10 States where CEO operates, our policy and advocacy efforts seek to diminish the impact that mass incarceration, mass supervision, and justice involvement generally, has on the economic opportunities available to a person after being released. Our policy team will be focused on creating more opportunities for individuals to secure employment and reducing the barriers they face in trying to achieve a more stable economic future.
Read the storyCEO Updates: SNAP Work Requirements: How Recent Changes Will Affect Individuals Returning Home From Incarceration
In December, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) published final federal regulations tightening work requirements for individuals to receive food assistance benefits under the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). This rule change applies to those receiving SNAP termed “Able-Bodied adults without dependants,” (ABAWDs) and is expected to cut off benefits for 688,000 people. These changes to work requirement waivers bring the first final rule from the three proposed in this past year to restrict SNAP eligibility, a program that is the nation’s largest nutrition assistance resource for low-income individuals.
Read the storyCEO Updates: CEO in the News: NYTimes and The Hill
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CEO Updates: Branching Out in the Rocky Mountain State
CEO opens a new office in Colorado Springs.
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CEO Updates: Growing Our Roots Along the Mississippi
CEO opens a new office in Memphis.
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