NYC Opportunity Launches a New Training on Working with Job Seekers Impacted by the Legal System
The Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity (NYC Opportunity), CUNY School of Professional Studies, and the John Jay College Institute for Justice and Opportunity are launching a free new e-learning course, Unlocking Employment: How to Partner with Job Seekers Impacted by the Legal System.
Unlocking Employment was created to realize our shared commitment to improving economic outcomes for New Yorkers involved in the criminal legal system, and with the goal of transforming our system by reaching staff across the entire provider community. This e-learning course helps workforce development staff enhance their capacity to serve people with legal-system involvement and seeks to reduce the stigma associated with criminal conviction among workforce development providers.
This professional development initiative aligns with Mayor Eric Adams’ strategic focus on upstream public safety solutions that reduce recidivism through connecting New Yorkers to jobs, training and services, and builds capacity in New York City’s workforce development system to better serve low-income jobseekers.
Open to all NYC workforce development service providers, this four-part, 90-minute online training covers topics such as the impact of criminal convictions on job seekers, tools and best practices to support the job search, and legal protections available to individuals with criminal convictions.
Unlocking Employment provides an opportunity for workforce development staff to explore a strengths-based approach and effective practices. It includes access to a curated resource library, providing additional tools to help participants advance their professional development and better serve clients who have past or current criminal legal system involvement.
Unlocking Employment is funded and overseen by NYC Opportunity. The course curriculum was developed by NYC Opportunity and CUNY partners, with support from the Workforce Professionals Training Institute and Legal Action Center, and input and review from various stakeholders, subject matter experts, and individuals with lived experience in the legal system.
Learn more and register to take the e-learning course here: Unlocking Employment: How to Partner with Job Seekers Impacted by the Legal System
