Lessons from the Street: Capacity Building and Replication


Appendix 5:
Excerpts from the Argus Replication Training Video


Female: See, I have a real serious attitude problem and I blamed everybody else for my problems because I wasn't attending school. I was a single mother of two.

Mary Taylor: (Vice President, Clinical Services). The problem is a lot of these kids are from deprived families. A lot of these kids are second and third generation substance abusers, alcohol abusers. Argus provides socialization skills, education, and job training. It also provides bonding an extended family, nurturing and adults who really care and see the positive potential in our participants.

Richard Weiss: (Director of Training and Treatment Services). The Learning for Living for Living Center is a program for 140 high-risk youth from the ages of 14 to 21. High risk means that they are experimenting with drugs and/or have parents and siblings who are a little more involved in drugs.

Steve Chesterson: (Teacher, Computer Services). I think Argus is successful with their approach because it is all encompassing. It is academics, which the Board of Education offers. It's a counseling support, job placement support, health support. They have a health educator here. Every phase of the students?development is addressed here at Argus.

Staff Development
Mary Taylor: (Vice President, Clinical Services). Staff development which I oversee and participate in, is one of our most important projects here. Many of our staff people are from the same environment, the same background that the kids come from.

Richard Weiss: (Director of Training and Treatment Services). I was an intravenous heroine user for 20 years.

Al Strother:  (Vice President of Operations). I was an ex-addict. I graduated from Phoenix House in 1969.

Nadine Jackson: (Primary Counselor, Job Horizon Counselor). My parents were alcoholics so I grew up in an alcoholic home.

David Sousa: (Staff). I am from the South Bronx, myself. I grew up in New York City. I graduated from high school, barely making it.

Gary DeVoe: (Job Developer). I come from a broken home, and someone helped me.

Richard Weiss: (Director of Training and Treatment Services). One of the most important parts of my job is staff development. What that means is not only training, but encouraging staff to take the chance and grow personally, as well as professionally. We have weekly staff development groups and basically what that is are personal issues groups for the staff.

Family
Charmaine Swearing: (Director of Learning for Living Job Horizon Program). If I had to

describe what makes Argus work, it would be family. The enrollees come in and they sense that they belong. They feel that we genuinely care about them.

Roselyn Martinez: (Program Participant). From the minute I got here, everybody just made me feel really comfortable -- everybody was like a family.

Steve Chesterton: (Teacher, Computer Services). It is truly a family. Many of our students have been through the comprehensive New York City high schools that have 3,000 students and they have literally gotten lost . Every aspect of their lives, someone here is interested in it. Many of our students have children and that's dealt with -- problems in day care, how can they get their kids taken care of; health issues. It's all dealt with.

Student Life
Rita Puddell: (Teacher/Administrator, Board of Education). The classes are small. There are nearly 15 to 20 students a class. The teachers get to know every student. We talk about the students at lunch or in meetings. They become friends.

Steve Chesterton: (Teacher, Computer Services). We found that the computer itself is a motivator. It is an intrinsic motivator. Students will do work on a computer that they may have difficulty doing with a pencil and paper so I use the computer to increase their reading skills, to increase their comprehension skills and through all of that they are learning computer literacy, which certainly is going to help them with whatever job they get.

Jobs
Gary DeVoe: (Job Developer). It is not easy convincing employers to hire our young people. They are very reluctant at first. But once they see our young people's behavior -- that they are responsible and capable of doing the job -- I get calls back for more.

Charmaine Swearing: (Director of Learning for Living Job Horizon Program). After they do get the job, then we stay with them. We make sure that we call them in the morning. Are you going to work? Do you have money for lunch?

Al Strother: (Vice President of Operations). We teach them how to retain the job and, if they lose it, how to get another one.

Carol Alston: (Program Participant). Right now I am not on public assistance and I was before. I am earning $10.45 an hour. Everything is great. I couldn't ask for anything more.

Charmaine Swearing: (Director of Learning for Living Job Horizon Program). The last person went on the job interview this morning and he got a job, so right now we stand at 100% -- we have placed 27 out of 27 for this training cycle.

Success
 Carol Alston: (Program Participant). They tell me to open up. Before I came here, I was very shy, I was very closed in. I couldn't communicate well with other people and they showed me how to be able to do that and not to be afraid -- to go out there and try new and different things. Roselyn Martinez: (Program Participant). Argus has prepared me for what I am today. I am a better person -- better attitude, definitely. I learned to calm down my temper and how to get along with people.

Carol Alston: (Program Participant). So they have given me everything that I know now. Without them I wouldn't be where I'm at now.

"It Works?"
Mary Taylor: (Vice President, Clinical Services). It would be helpful to replicate this program in other places, simply because it works. We're seen kids come in here really acting out behavior, coming from courts, and we see them graduate with jobs and hope for the future.

Closing Screen: "Learning for Living is a youth development program that works." U. S. Department of Labor


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