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Job and Life Skills Training Program

Empowering women to make positive changes

 

Our Program

Our Program

We are an intensive 20-week (20 hours per week) program that addresses the whole woman mentally, physically and spiritually.  Empowerment is at the core of everything we do.  We help the participants find their voices, discover their direction, establish their goals, and then help them figure out a way to overcome obstacles and achieve those goals.

The Soup Of Success Job & Life Skills Training Program (SOS) is a voluntary program and does not accept court ordered participation.  Referrals come from all over the county including therapists, schools, agencies, shelters, word of mouth and from Church Community Services pantry and financial assistance programs.  Women must be at least 18 years old, be literate, and must be free from alcohol or drugs.  If they do not already possess a minimum of a GED, they must be willing to immediately enter into a GED program.  Women put their names on the waiting list and must undergo an interview before being accepted into the SOS program.

Click below for a virtual tour of Soup of Success!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bw77s6PTbsw[/youtube]

Our Main Components

 

Group and Individual Support Soup of Success - Group and Individual Support

  • Daily check-ins
  • Weekly sharing and group support
  • Crisis intervention
  • Referral services
  • One-on-one goal setting & accountability

 

 

 

Education Modules Soup of Success - Education Modules

  • Computer training
  • Stress & time management
  • Money management/budgeting
  • Healthy relationships
  • Communication
  • Community resources
  • Workplace skills
  • Sewing
  • Staying healthy & safe

 

 

 

Career CounselingCareer Counseling

  • Self-assessment
  • Career research & networking
  • Résumé development
  • Job shadowing
  • Interviewing & job-seeking skills
  • Personal goals development

 

 

 

Getting Ahead Curriculum

  • Getting Ahead in a Just Gettin’ By World by Phil DeVol
  • Participants define and describe poverty—its causes, effects, and possible solutions—both in their own experiences and in the wider community.
  • Poverty is defined as the extent to which a person does without a range of resources, including but not limited to:

1. Financial
2. Emotional
3. Mental
4. Social
5. Physical
6. Spiritual
7. Integrity
8. Motivation & persistence
9. Relationships & role models
10. Knowledge of the hidden rules
11. Language

  • In addition to the Getting Ahead curriculum, Soup Of Success addresses these eleven resources throughout the entire 20 week program.
  • They create detailed plans for building resources for themselves individually, and they produce ideas and a vision for building a more prosperous community.

 

Hands-on Business Training (Social Enterprise)

Hands on Business Training

Women learn skills while actually running a small social enterprise. They are involved in all aspects of the business including:

    • Production
    • Marketing
    • Customer service
    • Quality control
    • Shipping
    • Inventory management
  • Proceeds from sales of our products go directly to paying the training wages for the women.
  • Current products include gourmet soup mixes, dessert mixes, dip/dressing mixes, gift baskets and greeting cards.

 

 

Mentoring/Graduate Follow-UpGraduate Follow-Up

  • Women are paired with trained volunteer mentors from the community during their second month in class. That relationship continues until well after graduation, adding much needed support.
  • Women in the program and their mentors meet several times per month
  • Monthly graduate reunion nights.
  • Support services for graduates include résumé updates, crisis intervention, referral services, emotional support and plenty of celebrating!

 

Soup Of Success Plants Seeds

All good things require patience.  Soup Of Success plants seeds of hope in the participants.  We care for them and give them the quality attention that they deserve so that they can bloom into strong, empowered women capable of achieving whatever they set out to do.  SOS graduates experience success in many different ways.

Our graduates have become strong enough to:

  • Leave a relationship filled with domestic violence
  • Regain custody of their children
  • Move out of the homeless shelter and into their own safe, affordable housing
  • Get a job that they love
  • Enter into a program, study hard and receive their GED
  • Maintain sobriety
  • Improve their parenting skills
  • Build positive support networks
  • Ace the state EMT exam
  • Receive their CNA certification
  • Receive their college degrees

These women all have the desire and motivation to improve their situations and strive toward self-sufficiency. They want to better themselves and improve the lives of their children.  Most importantly, they have stopped settling and realized that they deserve, and are capable of, dreaming and reaching their goals.

Soup Of Success appreciates the help of its many volunteers and supporters.  In order for SOS to be successful, we need the community to partner with us. Your assistance is critical to keep costs at a minimum, and to keep up with the need in the community as well as the demand for our products.

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