Open house offers training for unemployed
Town Stages owner Robin Sokoloff directly benefited from training from the Consortium.
munity partners and all in the same
room.”
According to McDermott this was
the first time everyone joined together
as one. “It was great to have
all the providers together under one
roof to talk about the challenges we
face today with new technologies as
PHOTO BY TODD MAISEL
we move into the future.”
The Consortium also provides legal
services and directions for health
to immigrants and others require it.
BY TODD MAISEL
Representatives, participants,
teachers and graduates from
the nearly 60 Consortium for
Worker Education partners gathered
at Town Stages in Manhattan to celebrate
and share their stories.
The Consortium for Worker Education
is a network of 35 unions and
45 community based organizations
that foster worker protection, education
and advancement. The Consortium
offers job training and skills to
become a carpenter or any number
of skilled tradesmen.
They also provide support services
to prepare individuals with special
trade education.
Few had a better story to tell than
Town Stages owner Robin Sokoloff,
herself a graduate of CWE’s partner
programs Nontraditional Employment
for Women (NEW).
With a degree in sociology and
passion for the arts, Sokoloff found
herself learning carpentry.
And now a member of Carpenters
Local 157.
Armed with her love of performing
arts and her new skills, she built
out and opened Town Stages.
“You can’t put on a performance
without a performance space. That
space has to be up to code,” said
Sokoloff. Now she is overseeing a
business, hiring workers, paying
wages and looking to replicate her
successful model.
“It started in a class with some 30
women, some with skills and some
unskilled. All that was needed was a
GED and willingness to learn.”
All now had skills, and good jobs.
NEW is only one of the nearly 60
programs and agencies which provide
the educational and support
services for workers, immigrants
and the unemployed and the underemployed.
CWE partners include
Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese
of New York, the Harlem Empowerment
Project, Make Road
New York, the Yemen American
Merchants Association, Coalition
for the Homeless, Edward J. Malloy
Construct ion Skills, Inc., and the
Actors Fund.
Supporting those efforts are the
more than dozen unions including
Plumbers, Carpenters, Painters, Operating
Engineers and Teamsters.
The unions provide training and
apprenticeships leading to careers
paying union wages and providing
advancement.
“I remember when we started 35
years ago and Anthony Alvarado
was our first director, and he said if
we do this right we can help 3,000
workers,” recalled CWE Executive
Director Joseph McDermott. “Today
we have 30 union and 30 Com-
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