Fresh out of highschool, Joshua Padilla, Adriel Carvajal and Jay Barbosa go to work day-after-day sustaining the town’s over 70,000 avenue lights.
On a typical day, 17-year-old Padilla mentioned, they’ll are available in, prep the vehicles, check the sunshine fixtures and head out to their first job website.
“Since I’m a city worker, when I’m working I get more people that come up to me and talk and they always have questions about the lights,” mentioned Barbosa. “So that’s pretty new, but also I enjoy that because they want to take care of their community, which I would probably do the same. It’s pretty nice, and I’m a friendly person too, so it doesn’t bother me.”
The three are among the many first cohort to get a jumpstart into metropolis work by means of a brand new job pipeline for grads of Madison Park Vocational Technical School. Earlier throughout their senior yr, they met with division officers, appreciated the job alternative and utilized.
“When we were presented with opportunity, it really changed — I’m not gonna say it changed my life, but it was like a stepping stone,” mentioned Carvajal. “My first step to being an adult, and I leaped at the opportunity.”
This is the primary yr of the pipeline, mentioned Street Lighting and Asset Manager Michael Donaghy.
“We were really looking for different and creative ways to recruit talent,” mentioned Donaghy.
Through a connection, Donaghy mentioned, the division reached out to Madison Park in the summertime of 2022 and labored out a possibility to satisfy with college students.
“So we met with them and were immediately impressed not only by their technical skills, but their professionalism and ambition to pursue a career in the electrical field,” mentioned Donaghy.
It’s a win-win state of affairs, Donaghy mentioned, giving the scholars a direct shot at working of their discipline and advancing their careers whereas addressing crucial metropolis staffing with well-trained candidates.
Through this system, the town pays for the chance to get an electrician’s licenses, pays for CDL licenses, and will get the grads began on a metropolis pension plan and metropolis advantages.
“I knew I probably have the technical capabilities to be able to just come here and maybe start off not as low as I would think I would,” mentioned Barbosa. “Because I have pretty much have four years of experience of electrical.”
Madison Park, the grads mentioned, gave them the fundamental expertise with issues like wiring and constructing.
As for the longer term, Barbosa and Padilla mentioned they’re planning on sticking with the job lengthy sufficient to construct a profession and future paths. Carvajal added he plans to get his electricians license and work in direction of proudly owning his personal firm.
“I never thought I’d be doing this,” mentioned Barbosa. “If I went back until my freshman self and said I’d worked in the City of Boston at 18 after high school, I’d probably be like, ‘Nah.’ But now I could work here, build off of that, and even create a career for myself, and so on, so forth. And anybody could do that. So I’d tell students just keep your options as high as possible. And don’t limit yourself.”
Source: www.bostonherald.com”
