We Train

Problem: If a reentrant, coming out of long term incarceration, isn’t prepared to assimilate into a workplace culture, the results could be disastrous. 

Solution:

Many of our Employer Partners guarantee jobs for reentrants who graduate from our Jobs for Life

course. Here’s why:

• This course teaches a clear understanding of employer expectations.
• Students develop a ready attitude for work and an understanding of how they can be an integral part of a team effort.
• It provides confidence building. 
• A career assessment points students in a general direction for their future.
• A vocational plan is a roadmap from any job, to a better job, to a career.
• Resume´preparation and mock interviews prepare students to meet with potential employers.

Considering that, according to Zippia research Summary, 89 percent of those who are rearrested are unemployed, graduating from Jobs for Life and going to work provides a real chance at a better life. 2nd Chance Indiana has become Indiana’s Certified Provider of the course. It's a biblically-based job preparation course that is taught in 300 cities in nine countries across the globe, and our version has been modified to relate specifically to the justice involved population.

We offer Jobs for Life to inmates preparing for release from Indiana prisons or from long-term incarceration in Marion County Adult Detention Center and county jails, to those being supervised by community corrections, on parole or probation.

Our Jobs for Life students learn that:

• You were made to work.
• You were created with God-given skills and talents to apply to your work.
• There is dignity in work.
• We worship God through our work.
• We serve our family and meet our needs through work.
• We love our neighbors through work.

Although the course is built on a Christian foundation, people of any faith or no faith are welcome to participate. We don’t preach to students or attempt to convert them, but we do encourage them to understand their value as a human being, and how to make honest work a central feature in the creation of a new and better future.

Each Jobs for Life student is paired with a personal mentor, a Champion, who walks alongside the student during the 10-module course, helping him/her to identify and overcome obstacles. Champions make an effort to remain in close contact for six months to a year after graduation, and hopefully the duo will form a lifelong bond.

We do our best to educate area employers about Jobs for Life—the course content, the emphasis on character development, and the high level of participant commitment required to complete the course—in hopes that more employers will grant priority consideration to our Jobs for Life graduates.