AP: For some long-term unemployed, hope arises: A job audition

[Omaha Steve]

In this Wednesday, April 1, 2015 photo, Bill Lewis works at his desk at CMS Mailing, in Monroe, Conn. Lewis was hired by CMS Mailing through Platform To Employment, a nonprofit program that offers to pay some long-term unemployed workers' salaries for their first 8 weeks on a new job, essentially eliminating the companies' risk of hiring of them. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill)

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20150506/us--long-term_unemployed-job_auditions-81e8f15e00.html

By CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER

WASHINGTON (AP) — Bill Lewis was under more pressure than most new hires when he began a job in information technology last year in Monroe, Connecticut. Jobless for a year, he had eight weeks to persuade his employer to keep him and pay his salary.

A commercial mailer had offered Lewis something usually associated with actors or dancers:

An audition.

It came through a nonprofit, Platform to Employment, that covered Lewis' pay through a program that targets a major scar of the Great Recession: The 2.6 million Americans who have been jobless for over six months. Many of them have long felt ignored by employers who assume their skills, drive or technological know-how have faded.

FULL story at link.

[KamaAina]

1. Maybe they could expand the program to workers with disabilities

Many of them have long felt ignored by employers who assume their skills, drive or technological know-how have faded.

In our case, they assume we never had them in the first place.

[KamaAina]

2. Alas, it seems to be confined to Connecticut.

In fact, it's HQ'd in Bridgeport, about a mile down the street from where I grew up!