Garis Charlie says he did not believe in jobs when he was growing up on the line between the Roxbps and Doresester neighborhoods in Boston.
People who have been known to have legitimate jobs, including his mother, did not find much success. Everyone in his community lived in verifying the paid choice and rent. Drug dealers were the ones who had money.
He says: “So I was invested in the streets: drugs, guns and theft. This is what I had fallen into an early age.”
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More than words are a library, but it makes more than the goods of $ 3.8 million annually. It serves young people who deal with homelessness or legal challenges and gives them a place to which they belong.
He ended up in detention of events at the age of 15, and imprisoned for theft on 23.
Near the end of the prison period for five years, a second chance has reached. An old manager of the job training program called more than the words that were visited, and asked him, “Garis, why don’t you just return?”
More than words are a library, but it does much more than selling the best -selling books. The program serves young people between the ages of 16 and 24 and who face the highest barriers to build a stable life. Participants face displacement, or in the custody system, or outside the school, or participate in the legal system. It gives them work skills, but graduates like Mr. Charlie say that the feeling of belonging and acceptance – which concerns them – is the most valuable thing they take from the program.
“I would like to say that we are in business,” says founder Judy Rosnabjam.
More than the word support goes beyond work training. There is a paid -paid “slope” from six to 12 weeks in which the program helps in everything starting from housing and food costs to ensuring that the participants have appropriate work clothes. Youth Development Managers provide support in a range of fields, including future employment, housing, transportation, financial planning and mobility in the legal system. After graduation, young people can access job services and finance the bridge for academic fees, rent and child care so that they can enhance their education and train them.
“None of this does if everything is not suspended together, right? Like a work training program does not mean anything if you do not know where to sleep at night or if you have a stadium the next day, and you do not have people who help you to plan and know that,” says Ms. Rosnaban.
More than words grew dramatically during two decades of existence. I started with an area of 150 square feet as young people sold online books. Today, three storefronts are run in Boston. About 318 young people have served last year, who sorted about 4.5 million books donated and received more than $ 3.8 million in net revenue.
Everything that is near all the words, the graduates of the words continue to obtain a high school diploma or their equivalent, according to the organization’s data. In general, about 60 % of young people and 66 % of homeless students who live in Massachusetts graduate within four years.
“Many people feel that they do not have a lot for them or have a lot of capabilities,” says Mr. Charlie. “We are talking about life to them.”
This was the case for him.
Over the past three years, young people have been directing more than words. It works in professional services, and helps young people in the area that has stumbled on it more than others: obtaining this first good job after graduating from the program.
Melanie Steston Freeman/Staff
“He was the first white man and trusted him.”
Mrs. Rosnaban was founded more than words in 2004. She worked as a general school teacher and child care system, and she became disappointment with government regimes.
She saw the same young people appearing in court because they were subsequently abused on charges of delinquency. He had no great meaning to her.
She says: “All these young people who were literally considered by the state by the state are victims of abuse and neglect, in need of protection from the state-and they were the ones who were literally tracked in the judicial system.”
Mrs. Rosnabjan has found that the sale of a book online has a therapeutic value. It has clear steps that lead to a positive result: picked up the book from where it was donated, discover the amount of value, the book packages, and its shipment, then watching the money comes.
“It was a result and organizing them in their chaotic lives,” she says.
Young people in every aspect of work, from working in the registry, participate to the design of the interior, to building financial models. The mural on more than Words’ Boston Boston site is the manual work for one previous participant.
More than the words Boston, where Mr. Charlie works, located on a street off the 93rd highway in the post -industry part of southern Boston. Dust and exhaust fill the air outside the store, located in a former factory building, on the afternoon of a sunny day in May. Inside, it is a wide and wide. At the forefront, wooden tables carry bags and socks across the body with giraffes and birds. All goods are made by companies that address social issues as part of their mission.
Melanie Steston Freeman/Staff
Mr. Charlie obtained his beginning in building shelves in the store in 2012.
He had attended the Lexington Mentuman Secondary School. He says there are limited vocational school sites for people from the city.
Mr. Charlie says he is grateful for the experiment, but he felt that he was only appreciated for his sporting perpetrator. When people greeted him in the corridors, he felt as if he was saying, “What is it?” For me, because I am Cornbreak. To my neighbor. “
“You don’t think the black person sees that?” He adds.
He left the school near the end of his second year after an event that included his cousin, he says. Arrest and detention of events. Then he found his way to more than words.
“He was the first white man to trust,” says Mr. Charlie. He always asked when he did not understand part of Mr. Charlie’s experience – instead of just stimulating advice.
“How will you tell me how to deal with my best friend in his head if you do not have the best friend who was shot in the head,” he says, he is retreating, then sharpening anger. “Don’t tell me how to deal with it.”
One of the goals of Mr. Charlie is to help his teachers understand their behavior, and in the end, discover how to stop doing things that make them trouble.
“Feeling of belonging”
Again when Chris Anderson joined more than the words, around 2005, he worked directly with Mrs. Rosnnjan. He was in a mass house in Waterown when he first faced it.
He says: “Judy walked at one time and we are all sitting in the living room just and said:” Does anyone want a job? “
He found a “sense of belonging” while helping Mrs. Rosnabum to start her work. The participants were stubborn, they faced a school problem, and did not do what they were supposed to do. “Regardless of what, I only continued to try to reorganize you to reach this path,” he says.
Melanie Steston Freeman/Staff
He first faced the state in kindergarten, when he threw milk in the face of his teacher. One of the officers recommended what was called at the time, or the child who needs services. After that, the Massachusetts Pediatrics and Families Department accused his mother of neglect.
At middle and high school, Mr. Anderson says he entered into battles, and police officers, who have been constantly exceeded in the class, brought knives to school, and even set fire to the hair of the schoolmates.
In the end, he ended up living in residential facilities, and then, collective houses.
While the recognition of some cases specialists was useful, although the country’s regulations in which he participated were “transactions”, he says. He had a few therapists through the children’s and families department, but his short work with each of them prevented the experience from feeling the value. “This is another one for you.” “Sorry, I will leave.” “This is another one for you.” This is what destroys it, like, destroying it. “
No one is stuck for a long time. Even Mrs. Rosnabum. Mr. Anderson, now in his 1940s, is still contacting her to advise his relationship with his children.
“How do you feel today?”
Near the entrance to the rear room where young people sort books in large boxes, the stickers with targets lined up on the wall of the wall near the entrance.
“What is your news?” Mr. Charlie says warm to one young man.
“Why are you looking? [at me]? “She asks, laughter.
“Because you are smiling at me. I just see what a matter is with you,” he says, matching her accent. “How do you feel today?”
Mr. Charlie still lives in the place where he grew up, in the Group Hall, which says everyone who finds a good job. He remained.
